Dawn of Chaos Control
by Tantrum
Summary: During a mission to protect the Flickys from Snively's attacks, Tails is abducted. In order to rescue their commrade Sonic and the Freedom Fighters will be pushed to their limits.
1. Another Year

Hello again everybody. This Fanfiction is a follow up on my other one entitled 'A Hole in Fabric'. If you haven't read that fanfic yet it is ok, however there maybe are a few points that you wouldn't understand unless you have read that first. Not TOO many but a few. And since this is a new story I'll go through my disclaimer again.

_Disclaimer: I do not own Tails, Sonic, Rotor, Sally, ect., ect. They are owned by there distinctive owners and are being used without permission. I wish them to beg my pardon and not to be hostile, and if they wish me to discontinue writing then I will do so by their command. If you read this and are not an owner of said companies you have just wasted valuable time reading this, Thank you and now on with the story. -----------_-

00000000000

As the colors moved about before him the older fox looked about for the shadowy figure. "What are you doing?"

The voice didn't respond as the colors started to take form, and scenes from the past he forgot started to come to him. After the stage was set, the darkness spoke again. "I'm going to show you what truly happened… the true events that make you who you are now."

VVVVV

In the underground village of Lower Mobius, it was dim as the power stone simulated nighttime. The streets were empty, but the lights were on in one building, and as one got closer to it the sound of voices could be heard, they were singing a song. Coming even closer, one could hear the lyrics.

"Happy Birthday dear Tails, Happy Birthday to you…" The chorus sang, and then died down with applause. The candles burned brightly as the fox smiled, he was a little embarrassed by the song, especially with everyone singing.

"Make a wish hun." Sally stated as they were ready for Tails to blow out the candles.

The fox thought a bit before he did so. What he wanted to wish was something that plagued his mind, every year before it was something sort of selfish. Like he wanted to be faster then Sonic last year, and the year before he wanted a new dirt hockey stick, which he got. This year though, he thought to himself, this year he'd wish for something that wasn't as selfish. He contemplated and made his wish. I wish I could live in a world without the fear of Robotnik was what he thought before blowing out the candles. Though it did sound possessive he believed that everyone had that wish in their mind.

"So what'd ya wish for big guy?" Sonic asked as he took the candles out of the cake.

"I can't tell ya that Sonic, if I did it wouldn't come true." The fox said shaking his head smiling.

"Oh, almost forgot about that." The hedgehog said with a smile.

* * *

"That must be it…" said a voice, looming in the darkness of a metallic bunker somewhere inside Robotropolis. The video was frozen on a bird that was flying right above a picture of an older fox. The vulpine was Selim, the older form of Tails that had stopped Snively's plan at world domination, before disappearing without a trace. The pointy nose human had spent a little over a week going over the tapes of the battle trying to figure out exactly what had made the vulpine disappear and now he was sure he knew. 

"Computer, run a data check on that creature." He said to the empty room, the creature in question was the blue bird, which had been yellow when Selim was in super form, but now was back to its original color.

A mechanical voice filled the room as the bird's data was analyzed. Its properties spilled out before the human, and to which he grinned. The flickies, a mysterious race of birds that are capable of teleportation, and supposedly come from another dimension. That must be what happened to Selim, the flickies must have sent him through time. He smiled to himself, if he could control those birds he could create a machine that would send him back in time, in which he would destroy the Freedom Fighters, and Julian before they rose to power, and then he alone would rule the world. He cackled with glee as a map displayed with a flashing red dot on an Archepeligo a good distance southwest of Robotropolis, he was going to Flickie Island.

* * *

Sally and Bunnie were picking up the dishes from the table. The others were in the adjacent room probably talking about where they would go from here. The girls looked at each others as they picked up the dishes at the opposite side of the table. They were thinking of their own little conversation to make the work go faster. Bunnie held in her thoughts until they reached the kitchen though, putting the dishes in the sink she looked over. "Another year, huh?" 

Sally nodded, "Yeah, I wish we knew how old he really is though… we put an approximation by his appearance…"

Bunnie sighs and puts a hand on the squirrels shoulder. "We go over this every year Sally-girl. I know we don't know everything about him, but ya'll shouldn't be too worried, he's happy now, it doesn't matter if today is really his birthday or not… we just made it today because it was half a year from when Sonic found him." She said looking into the princess's eyes.

The princess nodded. "I don't understand… Nicole knows my history, your history, Rotor's history. But if I delve into Tails's, or even the very early history of Sonic… it seems to cause this strange error to come up. Like the data is restricted permanently."

"Ya told me hun. I don't understand it either, but as long as I can remember Sonic was with us. I remember Charles came into town when I was about 5, and Sonic came with him, and afore that I have no idear."

Sally cocked her head and chuckles… "iDeer? What is that…"

Bunnie puts her arms across her chest. "Y'all makin' fun of little ol' accent Sally-girl?"

Sally giggled. "Naw, I ain't." She said smiling. "I'm just trying to lighten up; today we're supposed to celebrate." She picks up a glass with a colorful drink in it. "To living another day, and to those that fight for the next."

"Cheers." Bunnie smiled clinking an empty glass with Sally's, "Too bad I got nothin' to drink…"

* * *

Knuckles looked out off the edge of the island, it had been a quiet ten days since he had returned. He did get a few calls from Lower Mobius from his new 'allies', however nothing really major. There was something in the air, a sense of danger that he had become familiar with throughout his life. His eyes closed as the wind blew through his dreadlocks. There was a scent to the air, one he had become used to by now, it was a fire, destroying, consuming a woodened landscape. The guardian looked down to see smoke rising into the air from a land form below. 

"What is that?" He wondered to himself as he saw the archipelago, far below him. Having been to many places on his floating island Knuckles guessed that it must have been a freak fire. There was nothing on that island of any real significance… just a bunch of birds. Then he looked down closely, he thought he saw something, something moving. It was a grey object of some kind. He looked down peering, and now he was suspicious. He had to tell the Freedom Fighters about this strange occurrence, he would go himself, but it might be a ruse to get him away from the emeralds.

* * *

"Are you sure Knuckles?" Grif asked the echidna who was on the video display. Sonic and Sally were sitting inside the room after the guardian requested their presence. 

"There's defiantly something going down on Flickie Island… I thought I saw a flying machine heading in, but it was too hard to see. There was a fire though, so it wouldn't be a surprise if Robotnik was there." He said to the Freedom Fighters.

"Can't hurt to check, but what would old Buttnik want there?" The hedgehog asked crossing his hands in front of his chest, thinking aloud. "Maybe he was upset when they came into Robo-town…We'll check it out Knuxs, thanks for the heads up."

Sally looked at her palm computer; she was already looking at the information on the flickies, seeing if there was anything about them that Robotnik would want. She gasped as the display read out what she feared; there was a use for the creatures. "Guys, look at this…" She said, putting it up into a holographic projection. The information on the flying creatures displayed. "They can travel through space…"

Knuckles scratched his head. "I heard that a few of them can warp, however not as potently as the Chaos Emeralds."

"I don't like it one bit Sal… he's up to something… he's gonna use that ability of theirs somehow. We have to save them."

The princess nodded, and stood up. "We'll be right there Knuckles, thanks for telling us." She said shutting off the video conversation. She sighed and turned around in her chair. "And just when I hoped we would have a break…"

Grif nodded, "I wish I could help, but this is my village and I need to stay…"

Sally looked down. "I'm staying too… since the birds could be used as hostages we can't attack with a mass of people. A bulk of the Freedom Fighters will have to stay here. I have to be here for them." She turned to Sonic who seemed to be very curious on the game plan. She then continued. "We need someone fast, because as I said before, they might take the creatures hostage if we attack head on. You'll have to move quickly and quietly… We're counting on you Sonic…" she said with a smile. Plus she had to keep the blue one busy; he had started to think more about what happened to Uncle Chuck lately.

The hedgehog nodded. "Alright Sal… but can I ask one favor?" He asked looking up at her.

"Yes Sonic?"

"Can I bring Tails with me?"

Sally frowned and looked away a little, sighing. "Sonic this mission is too dangerous to get him involved…"

Grif looked to the two and he moved to the exit, obviously this wasn't a good time to be listening in, it seemed like this argument might get into subjects he would neither understand nor needed to hear, so he left the two in the room alone.

"Come on Sal! You promised after his 12th birthday he could go on any mission he wanted to…that was yesterday…" He said tapping his foot. "Besides, he was _supposed_ to be in charge of the freedom fighters at this very moment, we aren't even supposed to be here Sal…"

Sally sighed. "We are, because we are Sonic Hedgehog. Selim changed things, sure, but we aren't supposed to know that we are supposed to be dead. We just know because Selim told us."

"Come on Sal, if S'lim weren't there we'd be killed, that barrier would have made us sittin' ducks. If we had died Tails more then likely would have ended up just like Selim, because he isn't just a kid Sal. You see him for his age, I see him for what he is capable of. If he just sits here in Lower Mobius his whole life… he won't be capable of nothin' Sal." The hedgehog stated, shaking his head. "Sal, I'll be with him the whole time, you remember how helpful he was at Drood Hedge, and on the Floating Island, he'll be of great help to me now."

Sally sighed. "Fine, you take care of him, I guess I'm just being overprotective. Listen though, if he gets hurt I want to know, and don't let him out of your sight."

"Alright Sal, no problem." Sonic said nodding.

"Oh, and you should probably take this…" Sally said, giving her palm computer to Sonic. "She should be able to decipher their language."

Sonic nodded and took Nicole, and laughed at Sally, "Don't worry I won't let her outta my sight either." He said as he left the room, leaving Sally alone.

* * *

"Hey there, big guy." Sonic said as he walked into the pipeline segment that was currently being used like a hanger. The Tornado was sitting in the middle of the room, the fox doing some basic maintenance as the hedgehog was coming in. 

"Hey Sonic." The kit smiled as he stopped what he was doing and turned around. Wiping his oil stained paws on a handkerchief before putting the cloth down on a nearby table. "What's up?"

The hedgehog smiled, "We got a new mission comin' up T-2 and we want you to help."

The fox looked as if he just won the lottery; a smile crossed his face as he looked up to the hedgehog. "Really?"

As Sonic let off a nod the vulpine jumped up and shouted. "Past cool… Thank you guys… I've been waiting so long to go on an adventure… so where are we going?"

"Flickie Island… apparently ol' Buttnik found another species he hadn't touched yet, so we're guessin' he's down there messin' things up big time." He said. "But it's surrounded by water, so I need ya to fly us in."

Tails seemed a little disappointed when he heard that. He thought he was going on the mission, but it sounded as if all they wanted him there for was to bring Sonic to the island. The hedgehog noticed this and smiled. "Hey big guy, don't worry you're coming with me, I could really use your help out there, it'd probably be tough by myself."

The fox smiled; though he didn't really think it'd be too tough for Sonic by himself, he was glad he was allowed to go on this mission. "Thanks Sonic." He said as he shut a little hatch in the hull. He got into the plane's cockpit and let Sonic sit in the back seat. He turned on the engine and it purred beautifully, the hedgehog didn't know why that every time he heard the sound he wondered how the little guy was able to build something so efficient in so little time. It was a very beautiful biplane, unlike that air jalopy, the Freedom Stormer, they had built before which crashed when the hedgehog landed it. Of course the others were quick to blame his piloting skills, but it was more his attempt at showing off.

"We got a map I can use?" The kit asked back to the hedgehog who handed him Nicole, she had the map on display. Tails looked at it and thought for a bit. "It's a good thing I put more fuel in this thing, it'll take the full tank to get us there and back… I hope."

Sonic looked up at Tails as the fox made the plane move down the runway, "What do you mean by that…"

"Well, it's an educated guess, but it could be off by a bit. If I'm overestimating then we won't be able to make it back to the hanger without running out of feul…" He said, shrugging. "I'm a little worried."

Sonic smiled and shrugged back. "Don't worry about it, hopefully we can find some petroleum on the island, or maybe Knuckles has some, since the Floating Island is nearby…"

The fox nodded as the plane lifted off the ground. "Just remind me to grab some ok?" He asked as the Tornado went through the open end of the pipeline, flying off into the distance. Tails wasn't worried about the trip back right now. He was just eager to fly off to adventure.

00000

That's it for the first chapter, the second will be on its way May 13th, Friday. Mwhahahahaha. Trust me; there will be bad luck all around. Anyways hope you enjoyed this chapter, and if you liked this be sure to read my other one too, if you haven't already. Reviews on either story are always welcome if you can find time, and are greatly appreciated. See you next chapter.


	2. Green Grove Grief

"This doesn't make sense, what is this? This never happened, this is not my past." Selim said to the air as the images took a pause.

"**But it is. It is the past you thought you made for yourself, but really it is the one you had forgot."**

"You're not making any sense, why can't I just go home? Can't you just give me my memories back without making me live through them again?"

"**You cannot determine your future without knowing where you had come from. Regaining one's memory is not as simple as loosing it… if I showed you too much at once, you'd go into mental shock, like a dam breaking and the water crushing everything in it's path. You must drain the water slowly. Time has no meaning here, so we look for years. But too long and your molecules might alter in the time continuum, so let us hurry."**

The colors returned.

VVVVVVVVVVVV

"That looks like a good place to land, right over there Tails." Sonic said pointing at an open spot at the edge of the island. The fox nodded, the island looked so much bigger then he would had ever had thought. The size on the map hardly did it justice. Like the island hovering nearby this one had a volcano almost at its center. It was big, however it was a dwarf compared to the floating island.

The area Sonic had been pointing to was a quiet seeming meadow, or at least it would have been quite if there wasn't smoke jutting into the sky nearby. Tails came into the island low, hoping to avoid detection; Sonic said that Aunt Sally sent them here because they could move quickly. There was a possibility of hostage situations, and it was important to save as many as possible, the kit would not let them down. 

The ground was a soft brown, with thriving green grass growing out of it. The fox was very used to landing on soft ground, since he had done many landings on the Great Forest's floor. The plane landed smoothly on the ground. Sonic smiled as he climbed out of the cockpit. "Not bad big guy that was some great flying."

"Thanks Sonic…" he said scratching the back of his head as he got out of the cockpit as well. He sighed as he looked at the gauges before jumping down. "We have less then half a tank left. This isn't looking good.

The hedgehog nodded and thought, "Well we'll worry about it after we're done here, but for now we should hide the plane so that ol' Buttnick don't know we're here."

Tails nods and helps Sonic push the plane behind a thick brush, which the grove seemed to be so heavy with. When they were finished covering the craft in leaves they left the brush. "I hope he doesn't find it…" The fox said worried on what would happen to his plane if Robotnik discovered it.

Sonic smiled. "Don't worry big guy. He couldn't find clouds in a sky, no less a plane in a thicket."

The vulpine smiled and nodded as they walked deeper into the grove.

* * *

They head for the smoke, when every other intelligent creature would probably move away from it. As they moved along a cliff side, they saw green bushels of leaves grew out from the base, a light roaring could be heard, and Sonic could instantly identify it as a waterfall. Every time he heard one now he thought of hydrocity, the closest he'd ever been to death and the most scared he could ever recall being. Well, before the Uncle Chuck incident two weeks ago. He didn't like water in the first place, but that experience had given him almost an absolute fear of it. Not that he was afraid to drink it or touch it, but he couldn't immerse himself into it, unless it was a small bath of course. 

Tails rushed ahead a bit, and Sonic followed. "Tails hold on, we have to be care…" He then looked around and the scene about him instantly made him silent. There was a large blue waterfall that fell from the high cliff. A large study wooden bridge was a good distance from it, crossing the river that flowed below. Large blue flowers grew by the fistful nearby, a rainbow streaked out in front of the mist. It was awing, and very blissful.

Tails moved to the bridge and looked up at the waterfall's peak, "Wow, that's so beautiful."

Sonic let out a whistle. "Sure is."

The fox sat down at the bridge's edge, his feet dangling off the side as he continued to stare at the mist as it came up. "This is the best part of adventuring; going to new places. Don't you think Sonic?"

Sonic nodded. "Ya, it's always nice to see new places, meet new people." He looked down into the river, shivering a little bit though he wasn't really cold. "Unfortunately since ol' Buttnik came to town the pickings have been kind of slim where you can find beautiful places like this."

The vulpine nodded. "Knuckles once said, that the rarer the gem, the more people wanted it. Maybe that's why something like this just stands out… because places of this kind of beauty, where nothing has been touched, keeps getting rarer and rarer."

The hedgehog scratched his head. Tails had his moments where what he said was deep, especially for a twelve year old. He could never think like that, he was too quick minded. He was better at quickly throwing insults, making sentences that were made of only a few words. While Tails and Sally thought slowly, contemplating things that were so small and combining those into a long and deep thought. He nodded. "Yea, so we better not sit round all day while the big round guy add another spot to his list."

The twin tailed kit stood back up as he nodded. "We'll do it Sonic, so we can see this again, right?" He said as he smiled back at him.

"Right on big guy!" Sonic said with a nod, he starts to walk over to the other side of the bridge, and the vulpine followed. As they crossed another field of flowers the hedgehog frowned. Why was everything burning? He wished he could be free, to explore every inch of Mobius to see all the beauty it had to offer, but as long as Robotnik was here he couldn't do that. Don't get him wrong he liked playing hero, but sometimes he wished he could just run. No purpose or reason, just run because he could. Anywhere, for any reason, he'd bring Tails with him. Ever since the day he found the kit they've been great friends, and he would do anything for the little guy. He'd been through a lot of shit for having two tails, and it made the hedgehog angry every time he thought of it. He was glad that the fox had found a way in which his deformity could be used to help him, now the fox was as obsessed with flying as the hedgehog was with running. Together, they would be able to do this mission with no problems; Sonic knew he could count on Tails more then anyone in the world.

* * *

The smoke rose up into the sky as they made their way over to a ledge that seemed to lead down into another valley. They were getting closer to the source of the fire that was for sure. From here they could smell the burning. It reminded Sonic a lot of when they were escaping from Knothole. He looked down off the small cliff into the valley, crouched down so no one would see him. He wouldn't let the same thing happen here that happened to their home. 

His two tailed partner was kneeled down beside him, looking down into the valley. "So what do we do now Sonic?" He asked as he looked off in the direction of the smoke.

The hedgehog takes out the little palm computer from his pack that he had gotten from Lower Mobius, his other one had burned in the fire when the Swatbots attacked. He used to keep stuff like power rings in it. He had one in there right now, and he knew he'd need it sooner or later on this mission.

"Yo Nicole… got a map or somethin' we can check out?" Sonic asked.

"Here you are Hedgehog my man." Nicole said laying out a holographic display of the whole grove.

Sonic sighed and shook his head. "Like I can read this… come on Nicole, where are we?"

"Right here my main man." She stated a red dot blinking.

He still looked baffled and scratched his head. "And where do we need to go?"

"The Flickie are rumored to live in the far western part of the grove." The computer chimed. A picture of a flickie flashed on the projection, surprisingly nearby, just to the north west of their current position.

"That's more like it Nicole." The hedgehog said as he stood up, "That's where the fire is coming from, so we should probably go check it out. Now help me down the ledge, Tails."

The fox nods and smiles. "Sure thing Sonic." He said as he also got up and used his tails as a propeller, flying up a little bit in the air as the hedgehog held up his hands so Tails could grab hold. The vulpine moved forward and caught the hedgehog's wrists with his hands and lifted him off the ground. There was a little difficulty as he moved forward and slowly descended down the cliff face. It had been awhile since the vulpine had done this. They made it down into the valley as the hold was starting to slip. The fox let go as they made it to the ground, he breathed a bit heavily as he had to stop spinning his tails, and they were burning from the weight.

"Tails, you all right big guy?" Sonic asked as the fox caught his breath.

The fox nodded, "Just haven't done that in awhile is all…" He said as he panted a little and stood up. "I'll be fine Sonic, no problem."

Suddenly there was a shrill peep, almost like a scream only higher in pitch; the two Freedom Fighters looked to the northwest. Without a doubt, that is where the sound had come from. They both then looked at each other and nodded, as if they both agreed on an unasked order. The hedgehog and fox made their way through the undergrowth and followed a flowing river toward the sound and the smoke, ready for the conflict that was sure to come.

* * *

The air was shrill with cries for help when the two arrived on the scene. They peered through the brush; the fires could be seen as they roared, apparently obliterating a type of nesting ground. The birds were scattered about, some apparently trying to take offensive against the attacking robots, while the others appeared to be fleeing. An uncanny feeling came down upon the hedgehog, but this wouldn't end up like Knothole, this attack could easily be stopped. There was only a few bots, and they were of lower make, a few buzzbombers and catakillers, nothing he wasn't capable of handling, with his best bud Tails here, it would be merely child's play. 

"Alright Tails, we're gonna take em' out. You take care of those buzzers, and I'll take the cats." Sonic said, getting ready to spring their surprise attack. The fox nodded, this would be the first time he was given permission to attack something, the other times he did it without being told and the one time he did that with a buzzbomber he ended up finding himself in trouble. He had studied the robots though, and he knew their exact capabilities. Sally and Rotor had taught him well, and his own interest in the subject caused him to excel far beyond his mentors' expectations.

They jumped out of the brush, Sonic instantly going into a razor spin cutting the head off a catakiller as it chased after a flickie who seemed to have a broken wing. The head flew into the river nearby as the rest of the body squirmed about like a worm. 

Meanwhile, the fox flew into the center of the bees and gave them a raspberry, taunting them and catching their attention rather quickly. One aimed their stinger for the fox, firing a laser blast, to which the vulpine responded by raising his altitude causing the beam to go underneath him and hit the buzzbomber on the opposite side. The robotic bee broke apart as the beam cut through it, one down and two to go.

Tails flew away, taking the flyers with him into the trees as Sonic quickly moved to the next worm like robot. The hedgehog went into his spin dash attack and cut the robot in half. The two segments flopped around before they stopped dead.

* * *

The vulpine flew through the trees skillfully, the two buzz bombers right behind him. The fox quickly moved through the thickening foliage and thinks about how he would lose or destroy them. He then quickly spun around and flew backward, grabbing onto a jutting branch. Bending it back, he waited patiently as the buzzbombers tried their best to catch up. Just as they passed by the tree the vulpine let go of the branch causing it to snap back and hit the robots causing him to hear one get flung away and smash into a tree. 

"Yes!" Tails said as he flew out and saw the smashed robot. There was only one though, where was the other…?

Just then a buzz filled the fox's ears and he turned around, the stinker flashed in his eyes as it was pointing straight at him.

* * *

Sonic had one more robot to destroy, and he quickly made his way toward it. He suddenly is forced to stop as the robot opened its jaws and closed it around a flickie, threatening to crush the bird in its jaws. The hedgehog stayed absolutely still, he wouldn't do anything that would make the catakiller kill the creature. It started to back away slowly, Sonic began to think quickly, he couldn't let it get away, but he couldn't attack it. He felt himself start to have a headache; he couldn't decide what to do. 

0000000000

That finishes up this season, I got a lot done this year, thanks to all those that have continued to review. If all of you recall last year I stopped posting during the summer because I didn't really have access from my laptop. The good new is though, is that this year I'm going to make updates over the summer. However, they will be at a slower pace. The next chapter will be updated on June 3rd. Sorry it's so far away, but it's better then what I did last year, then you would have had to have waited until late August.

The beginning of this chapter did not really exist until I read through the reviews. So they do affect the story (Not the 'past' though, you can't change the past), but I'll be sure not to reveal too much to fast.

Also a reviewer for A Hole in Fabric made a good point, and thus made me think about how to cover my tracks, this is a good thing, and it's always welcome. I made a new section on my profile page for such reviews, and do my best to explain how I see the matter (And since this is fiction, it is probably far from Sonic Team 'truth').

Sorry about the 'VVVVVVVVV' Breaker. I needed something different then the dash, and I tried many other things to no avail. I'm a Computer Scientist, but the how keeps seeing seeing all my breaks as bad strings really boggles my mind.

Anyways, enough notes, see you next update.


	3. Riddling Rusty Ruins

VVVVVVVV

Sonic wished he had someone with him who could plan, he needed one desperately. He wanted to save the Flickie, but couldn't come up with a way to do it. If he got too close, the robot would crush the bird in its jaws. If he didn't do anything, the catikiller would get away with the hostage, and it probably would be used in Robotnik's experiments. He could go fast, but it would only take that bot a fraction of a second to close its jaws, and crush the creature in its mouth.

Something else crossed his mind just then. He had lost sight of Tails, and he worried that he could have been captured. If he was, the hero probably still had time to save him, he just had to get there as soon as he possibly could. His mind then settled; he didn't care if he couldn't save that one bird, just so long as he could make sure his bud was ok. The hedgehog got himself ready, he was going to try and rescue the hostage. As he was about to go into a spin, and the worm robot was now close to the brush, the contraption stopped and fell to the ground. Sonic stopped in his tracks as the robot laid there, the bird released from its jaws as the catakiller fell, deactivated.

Sonic moved up to it, scratching his head confused. Just then a fox jumped out of the bush, and smiled. "It was the red one, just like Aunt Sally said." Tails pointed to a red wire that was severed.

Finding himself relieved, the hedgehog smiled and smacked the kit on the back. "Past cool, big guy." Though as he hit the fox, the young one winced a bit. Sonic looked at where he had hit Tails and noticed a nice bruise. "Whoa, what happened? You alright Tails?"

The vulpine nodded, "No prob, a buzzbomber caught me off guard, but I took care of them all Sonic. You should have seen it."

He laughed, Tails was really something else. Getting hit by a laser was not fun, but here he was smiling it off. The fox was going to be one heck of a freedom fighter, and they all knew it too. "Tell me later big guy, right now we should talk to the locals and find out what lard butt is up to."

Tails nodded, as he followed Sonic back into the nesting area. They helped put out the fires, the fox moving to the river with buckets and dumping them on the high flames while the hedgehog was flinging up mud and dirt onto the lower fires. The flickies sat, relived, as the heroes had put out the inferno. Though the damage was pretty extensive, the grounds could be rebuilt. They were all happy that they were ok, but there was still a problem. They started to chirp at the two strangers trying to tell them something.

"Alright Nicole… you think you can translate what they're sayin'?" Sonic pondered, bringing out the palm computer again.

Nicole translated, the voices sounded shrill and high as they spoke. _"Thank you… Thank you."_

Sonic nodded, "No problem, savin's in the hero's job description. Though I have to ask what is going on… are there any others?"

"_Yes… you must save them, the four elders… they are in peril." _The chirps came out.

"Alright… but where are they?" The hedgehog asked, tapping his foot.

With that the birds flew off toward the brush, acting as if they wanted the heroes to follow. Sonic and Tails quickly chased after them.

* * *

The foliage came ot a halt as the fox and hedgehog both could see a large building that jutted out into the sky, it was pyramidal shaped, like an Aztec ruin, it squared up like a stair case. "Wow, that thing's huge Sonic." The fox said as he looked up at the old ruins.

The birds chirped. _"They took them inside our shrine… Please save them…"_

Sonic nodded. "Not a problem, we got it covered. Right big guy?"

The fox nodded. "Right, Sonic! Let's do it to it!"

They both ran for the ruins at full speed, racing each other to the ancient looking structure. They had to be quick, they didn't know how long they had before Robotnik would complete his objective.

* * *

The hedgehog waited in the large doorway while the fox finished making his way up the stairwell to meet the blue one at the door. "What took ya so long slowmo?" He smiled down at the fox. By the time they had reached the entrance the sky had turned a reddish tint, it would soon be nighttime, the sun just peering over the horizon.

The vulpine took deep breaths as he came up the final step. "You've gotten… faster Sonic…" He said as he sat by the doorway, looking down. "Either that or I'm getting slower…"

Sonic shook his head and put a hand on his bud's shoulder. "Listen Tails, I told ya I wasn't gonna hold back, and I didn't. I'm surprised on how well ya kept up." He said as he held out a hand to help Tails up. The fox grabbed the hand and pulled up. "If you're tired we can rest big guy."

Tails shook his head. "No, I can keep going." He said as the sun started to set behind his head. He turned to look at the sun as it started to disappear from the sky. The hedgehog watched with him, another day had gone by and there was still peril in the world. Every sunset was a milestone, to survive each day, to know that they were still fighting. Sonic knew he'd see many more sunsets. He wouldn't allow Robotnik's world. A world in which the sky would be so polluted, those that could appreciate such a specticle would never get a chance see it.

"Let's go inside Tails, we gotta do what we can to save this place… and keep Robotnik from changing history." The hedgehog seemed a bit more serious then his usually self. The young fox turned around and nodded as they went into the large opening that served as an enterence way.

The inside was a little bit dark, fiery torches burned light into the large room. Along the walls, a pictogram-like design seemed to stretch as far as the eye could see. In the center of the room was a monument that attacted most of the heroes' attention. A stone structure that looked like a rectangular pillar with a pointed top stood there, it dwarfed the hedgehog and his friend as they moved toward it. As they climbed up yet another flight of stairs to the platform in which the monument stood, they had noticed something written in what seemed like a large plaque, which was rusted over a bit.

"What does it say Sonic?" Tails asked as they tried to make out the apparently ancient writings on it.

Sonic shook his head and laughed. "I was about to ask you the same thing…" He took out the palm computer again and pointed it at the writing. "Alright Nicole slap me some translation."

Nicole beeps and blips as she translates the plaque. "The script reads as follows: _During the light of day, Reflect upon yourself. You will find your way, and be taken somewhere else."_

The hedgehog scratches his head. "Why can't these ancient people speak in a way I can understand? I need a translation for the translation." He said as he looked around.

Tails smiled and shrugged. He then noticed something. "Sonic, they said that the robots took the elders here, but I see no sign of them anywhere… do you think they were 'taken somewhere else'?"

Sonic nodded, "Probably… but how can that be I don't see how a robot could reflect upon itself, maybe Robotnik was with them. Though, I don't see how that big lard bucket could accurately think of himself."

The fox thought a moment, "It might not be talking literally, either way we can't do anything until it's day time. So I guess we'll have to wait until then…" He said sitting down and sighing.

Sonic followed and still thought, looking around the room and noticed how it continued to get darker, he looked up noticing there was a hole in the ceiling. It was in the shape of a large square that made the center unprotected from the elements. The sky was a darkening purple, the stars starting to sparkle down upon the two.

The fox wrapped his two tails around himself to keep warm as a cold chill of night started to rise through the structure. The hedgehog laid against the monument, keeping his eye on the kit to make sure he was alright. "I think we did a great job today Tails, we dusted those bots."

Smiling, the little fox looked over to Sonic, "We sure did, I'm so glad you let me come this time Sonic. It feels so good to make a difference." He looked down, "Though it was a bit scary when that buzzbomber caught me off guard." He said with a little shiver.

Concerned the hedgehog looked to the fox, "How is that wound doing anyway big guy? Are you going to be alright?" He looked at the wound, and it seemed to be healing fine. "You're tougher then I thought T-2 you got your first battle wounds."

Tails chuckled a bit. "I'm doing fine Sonic, thanks… that buzz brain didn't even know what hit it…"

Sonic laughed. "Are you going to tell me a story Tails? I thought that was my job."

The fox felt very highly of himself, this was the first time he had any exciting stories to tell, every time before he would listen to the stories of Sonic, or even Antoine when he was gullible enough to believe him as a hero. Both the hedgehog and the coyote tended to exaggerate in their tales, of course the royal guard's were far more brimming with lies then Sonic's, and much more obvious. However Tails was not a very good exaggerator, though he did when his friend told him to. He never really had the chance to come up with his own half-lies. Since he wasn't good with lying, he decided to just go with the truth.

Tails took a breath "Well I flew in between all three of the buzzbombers and one of them was going to shoot me so I dodged it and the blast knocked one of them out. Then I flew away into the forest and the two that remained followed. Then I—"

Sonic found himself falling asleep, the back of his head hit the monument he was sitting against, effectively waking him up. "Whoa, Whoa, hold on big guy… you can do many things, but man I gotta teach ya how to tell a story. Ya sound like a computer manual."

Scratching his head the vulpine shrugged, he was a very technical person, unlike Sonic who'd rather be spared the details. "Guess so Sonic, I guess I just told it how I saw it…"

"Nothin' wrong with that Tails, just you gotta kick it up a notch, ya know. Get them hooked, beggin' for more. Here I'll give you an example: 'The Flickies were in great peril, the robots were threatening to take them away for Buttnik to do some crazy experiments on them. I took the three buzzbombers, flying in between them swiftly. I taunt them. That really pissed them off, one of them popped a shot at me, but I quickly dodged upward making the laser whiz by, almost burning my sneakers. Luckily though, it missed and hit another one of the buzz-brains knocking it out of the sky…'" He then stopped as he noticed the fox watching him intently, as if he was wondering what would happen next. He laughed a bit "Hey, this is your story big guy. Why don't you take it from there?"

The fox thought a bit. "KAPOW!" He started causing the hedgehog to jolt awake. The vulpine laughed. "Bits and pieces rained to the ground, the robot shattered. With one down, two to go, I blast into the forest using my two tails with all the energy I could muster. The two were right on my tails narrowing closer, and closer, I knew I had to do something quickly or I'd be caught. Suddenly an idea hit me, I swung around grabbing a branch and pulling it with all of my strength and waited for the right moment. They were coming, closer and closer… I had to wait for the right moment... There! I let go and the branch and it snapped at the group of buzz bombers. Crash! I heard the sound of one of them falling to the ground. I flew around and saw the remains of one of the robots, but… the other one… where was it? There was a sudden buzz in my ears and I spun around, the buzz bomber was right behind me…" The fox stopped, he heard a snoring noise and looked over to the hedgehog. "Sonic?... Sonic?"

The hedgehog was sound asleep. And the fox scratched his head and let out a sigh, maybe he needed a little more work on his story telling skills… or maybe his friend was just tired. He yawned, he was tired as well. Wrapping his two tails around himself he leaned back against the monument and closed his eyes. Today had so much adventure, he wondered what the next day would bring.

0000000

Sorry about the late update, had internet trouble. That's all for this week next update will be on June 17th. Sorry it's going so slow, but it's the summer and I'm a bit busy. Keep those reviews coming and thank you to everyone who has so far.


	4. Spring Stadium Seizure

"Sonic? … Sonic!" The hedgehog heard as his eyes opened. The fox was right in front of him as the hedgehog opened his eyes. They held a sparkle of what appeared to be worry in them.

"Tails… what's wrong?" The hedgehog asked. As he jumped up and looked to the fox, and then he noticed something he hadn't before. The kit was bleeding, from what appeared to be just a simple bruise earlier. "Tails, lay down, slowly… I'll see if I can't find a bandage." Sonic tried his best to stay calm, looking through his back, his hands shaking. He knew he had one in there somewhere...

Just then the sun rose up and a light came down upon the two, the hedgehog had to cover his eyes. The blinding light suddenly turned into darkness. Sonic opened his eyes and found himself floating through space. He was alone, Tails was nowhere to be seen, and instantly the hedgehog became worried. "Tails!" He shouted into the darkness, with no response except for an echo. He looked around desperately trying to find his friend, but all he saw was the darkness.

He tried to call out again, he got a response this time, but it was not in the voice of the little kit. "He can't hear you here." A low voice said, it sounded sinister yet smooth. He turned around to see a hedgehog that looked a lot like himself, only it was black. Sonic took a step back as the form appeared.

"W-Who are you?" The blue one asked as the form approached, it seemed to have red streaks in its quills. It's eyes opened up and stared at the blue hedgehog.

"I don't have a name, I am merely a shadow of the reflection that is yourself. And in order to be successfully transported elsewhere you must defeat me…" He said narrowing his eyes.

"Listen I don't have time for this, my friend is in trouble." The blue hedgehog growled, he didn't want to be bothered with whoever this was right now.

"You have no choice, you shall be lost forever if you don't face me." The form retorted. Crouching down and getting ready to strike.

Sonic found himself become angry; he really had no time for this! Without any warning he charged forward with a buzz attack catching the shadowed hedgehog off guard with the attack. It contacted, and the blue hedgehog found himself covered in warm fluid as he cut clean through. He stopped and turned around, seeing the dark hedgehog laying in two segments on the ground. There was blood coming out of the two pieces, however there were also wires that were severed, and what appeared to be mechanical parts.

As the blue hedgehog moved in upon his so called reflection, lying in a puddle of blood the top segment moved causing Sonic to jump back a little. The low voice came out hoarsely. "So who is the monster… you or I?"

"What?" Sonic asked scratching his head. "What are you talking about?"

There was no answer, however, as the darkness that surrounded him disappeared. He was suddenly surrounded by light, and he had to cover his eyes as they adjusted to the sudden brightness. He opened his eyes to see that he was inside a building that was well lit. The floor was a strange blue color; the room was far more colorful and festive looking then the ruins he was in earlier.

He noticed something else on the floor, there were deep red dots that made a trail down the corridor. "Tails!" He cried as he suddenly remembering the danger his friend was in, and that the red spots were probably from the fox's injury. He quickly followed the trail, running as fast as he could. He didn't think of anything else but finding his two tailed friend, he would not let him die… he would not fail to protect him. What would he say to Sally? If the little guy died, she would never forgive him… he ran faster down the hall.

His feet planted on a strange looking platform and he felt himself fly through the air uncontrollably. He flipped as his feet started to raise above his head and ended up landing in a large area. As the hero regathered his surroundings he wondered what happened. It felt as if the floor had suddenly thrown him into the air as he stepped upon it, like a spring.

The hedgehog shook his head as he caught his bearings, and then he heard something. He picked his head up to look and see Tails, bound and gagged to the wall, a large chair sat next to him, facing the opposite way, a large arm on the rest. There was a deep chuckle.

"Tails!" Sonic cried as he started to charge forward.

Suddenly a metal pike shot out of the ground, cutting off Sonic's path. Then a slew of them followed effectively boxing him in. The hedgehog growled as the chair spun around, he wanted to help Tails so badly, and he felt himself become angry. "Let him go Robotnik!"

The laugh echoed in the room. "Now why would I bring myself to do that…? I mean seeing both of you helpless; just give me a nice tingly feeling inside." His voice was like it usually was, a deep belly busting bass that sounded as evil as his heart was. He pressed a button and suddenly a slew of robots landed into the enclosement Sonic was stuck in. "These should keep you busy while I make a nice new robot for my collection."

Sonic shouted and cried out as the two Tail fox started to cry in pain and the captive started to glow. The hedgehog was hit in the back by a robotic spider causing him to smash into the bars of the pikes. He turned around and growled, he felt a rage fill up in him. The multitudes of robots were ready to kill him, and he was now ready to do the same.

In lightning speed the hedgehog started to spin rapidly, and he cried out as he smashed through them. Pieces flew in the air as Sonic, in his anger and rage, smashed through the spiders and wasps the horde consisted of. He used a homing attack to the final flying wasp and used his height to jump over the raised spikes, landing on the ground outside the box that was supposed to keep the hedgehog trapped. No bars or cage would keep Sonic from saving his pal though.

When he looked over at the kit... he saw it was too late. The metal body clanked forward as it was released from it binds, it's once blue eyes now a deep crimson. It's orange color looked like that of rust, the energetic and liveliness that always filled the kit's face now gone. "Tails?" Sonic asked, his heart stopped, he felt numb… this couldn't be happening. "Tails!" He cried, his voice echoed throughout the room. The hedgehog felt himself burst with rage, and unfortunately for Robotnik he was here to take the brunt of his fury.

Without hesitation he whirled into a buzz saw attack lashing at the fat man sitting in the chair, he tore through him and the chair, again and again and again. He didn't stop, his anger still raged and he kept on slicing until he ran out of breath, it was to the point where he had to stop in order to catch his breath.

When all was said and done he got on his knees and coughed, he felt like he was going to throw up. His quills dripped with the blood of his oldest enemy but his friend was still standing there in his new metal skin. He cried, he didn't know what else to do as the two tailed machine walked up to him. "Sonic?" It asked causing the hedgehog to jump a bit.

"Tails are you in there?" He asked looking up at the machine. He stood up and moved toward it, tears in his eyes. "You still there big guy?" He sniffled.

"Sonic!" The cry got louder.

* * *

Sonic snapped up, his quills scrapping against the center monument. He quickly looked around, a familiar set of blue eyes were set upon him. The hedgehog felt himself breathing heavy and sweating a little. As the form before him turned out to be the bud he thought he lost, he instantly realized that it was all a dream. He looked up through the hole in the ruins. The sky was red again, only this time it was brightening instead of dimming.

"It's morning already, huh?" Asked the hedgehog as he stretched out and stood up.

"Ya it is…" Tails said as he looked about the room, and then back to Sonic. "Are you feeling alright?" He asked, noticing how out of it he was acting.

The hedgehog nodded and smiled a bit, he was very relieved it was a dream, and he knew that losing his friend was always a personal fear of his, so he was not surprised he had a dream about it. In the back of his mind through another part of the dream was burning in his mind. That other hedgehog, his 'reflection', called him a monster. What was all that about? He couldn't think of it right now, the sun was starting to peer and they had to figure out how to solve the riddle they found last night. Which had to do with reflecting upon oneself. But what the hell did that mean?

Tails nodded. "Alright Sonic, now I think I figured out the trick to the puzzle."

The hedgehog cocked his head. "Really? What do you think it means."

The fox pointed at the sign on the monument. "Well it says to reflect upon yourself right?" he asked, to which he received a nod. "It didn't make much sense to me, since I think that there must be a teleportation device, and if you look at the floor in front of the sign, there is a pad that looks like it might be one."

Sonic looked at the floor and there was a round platform on the floor that was kind of dark green in color. He wondered why he hadn't seen it before, it sort of blended in with the floor, but when one took a closer look it was obviously there. "Yeah but what does this have to do with reflection?"

Tails smiled, kind of proud of himself that he figured it out before Sonic. "Well, there has to be some way to power it. There is only one reason that I can think of why it would need to be daytime to use it, and I came to a conclusion. Right below the sign is a solar panel, which means 'reflecting upon yourself' doesn't mean mentally. It means physically reflect the light upon where you're standing."

The hedgehog scratched his head. "Then why didn't they just say so? Why can't people ever say what they mean?" He laughed as he shook his head.

The fox shrugged, he looked up around the room noticing a giant mirror. "It looks like it's already pointing the right way, probably Robotnik jarred it in that position so all we have to do is wait for the sun to get high enough… it should soon." Tails stated.

The hedgehog yawned. "I really hate waiting." He said sitting back down. Tails sat next to him as the sky was now becoming its true blue color. The fox liked watching the clouds. He couldn't wait to fly in them again, but he had to finish his mission here with Sonic. He looked over to his idle as he thought about all that had happened in his life that lead up to this. This big mission where it was him and Sonic against the army of robots that Robotnik would send their way.

Tails thought back to Selim, a hero he never really got to know that well before he met his fate. Uncle Chuck, also was gone, and he knew it saddened Sonic greatly. His friend though, kept talking tough around him, as if nothing was wrong. Tails was more perceptive then that. He wondered why Sonic did that, tried to act tough constantly around him. He knew like all of them he felt great sadness at the loss of their homes and friends, and right now when he thought about it, he started to feel homesick.

"Sonic… I miss Knothole." He said as he looked up at the sky, the light in the room getting brighter.

The hedgehog put an arm around the little kit. "I do to Tails. When this is all over, we'll restore the forest, and though we may not see it like we did once… our children will."

Tails scratched his head, he was a little too young to think about having a kid, but that wasn't the most outlandish part of the proposition. It was more of the 'when this is all over' part. He sat his head in his hand and sighed. "Will this ever be all over?"

Sonic shrugged, he had wondered that himself quite a bit. He didn't have the answer, no one did. Just then a bright light blinded him and he stood up and moved to the side. The light was shining off the mirror and struck the solar panel. The circular pad on the ground lit up and sparkled ready to take Sonic and Tails elsewhere.

The hedgehog looked to Tails. "Are you feeling ok bud, how's the wound?" He asked suddenly concerned on his well being, a weird déjà vu feeling of the whole situation. The question caused the fox to check himself. "Ya I'm fine Sonic, now let's get going!"

Nodding to the vulpine, Sonic moved toward the pad, keeping Tails close; he didn't want what happened in his dream to happen here. He would not lose the kit to the likes of Robotnik. As they both stepped onto the platform a bright light washed over them and the room in which they stood was empty again.

* * *

Snively grinned wickedly as he slammed a glass cylinder down around a red Flicky. There were two other cylinders adjacent to this one, both containing one of the elder birds. The fourth cylinder was empty, where the hell was that fourth robot?

"Sir..." a swatbot called, making the human turn around. "The bots in the grove haven't reported when they were designated to, investigation of the area showed that they had been destoryed, and the fires in the Flicky Village distinguished."

The human twitched inwardly, he instantly knew exactly what was going on, Sonic has come to stop him. This is going to make things far more complicated then he intended them to be... He had come to far to be interfered with now. "I want spybots up, find me that Flicky and search for any signs of rodents, NOW!"

"Yes sir." The robot walked out of the room leaving the tyrant alone with the three captive Flickies.

Smiling vilely into the glass, admiring his own reflection, the madman chuckles. "It doesn't matter how fast you are hedgehog, by the time you get here, neither you or the Freedom Fighter would have ever existed."

00000

That's all for now, the next update will be on July 8th. I appritiate SonicRules12 for being honest in his review, looking over these past chapters I agree, I'm making the storyline a little too clique. In future chapters I hope to try and push the characters to their emotional limits (Actually the last section of this chapter didn't exist until I read this review, and I think it made it wrap up much nicer.) So, even if what you have to say may not be considered a 'nice' review, let me have it. Can't get better without knowing if there's a problem.


	5. Diamond Dust Distress

There was a sudden chill in the darkness, and a harsh wind. Sonic looked over to his side, and Tails was still there, to which he felt relief. He held the fox's hand tight when suddenly the light started to flood back; they seemed to be done teleporting. The cold stayed though, and in a moment it was easy to see why. Around them was a sea of white. Snow, and ice, and looking about it seemed like they were on the side of the volcano. They would have to move up the side, but it seemed that it wasn't too steep at this end, yet it was so far away.

Sonic looked down as he wrapped his arms around himself. It wasn't as cold here as it was in the Ice Cap Zone on the Floating Island, but it was freezing. The hedgehog noticed some tracks. His fox companion shivered heavily, "Sonic… I hate the snow." Sonic looked to the vulpine, and nodded. He knew Tails hated the snow, but it wasn't as bad as the hedgehog was to water. Probably the only thing the kit was really afraid of was lightning and thunder. Sonic couldn't blame him for not liking the snow, the fox was stranded in a snow storm when they were heading for the launch base back on the grounded Floating Island. They got separated and Sonic couldn't find him for the longest time. He could only imagine what the kit went through, and ever since the two-tailed fox had stayed clear of the white stuff must children would have been all over. Unfortunately, they couldn't avoid the snow this time; they'd have to follow the tracks in the snow in order to rescue the elders.

Tails shivered lightly as the two moved; the ice and cold washed over him, Sonic looked over to him and put an arm on his shoulder. "Don't worry big guy. We'll find them soon enough and then we can leave, I know you don't like the cold." He said wishing that he didn't have to drag his friend through this, but they couldn't let Robotnik get away… he knew that his bud could handle it, especially when there was someone in peril. Like Sonic could tolerate water if Sally was in trouble or he had a chance to stop this war once and for all, it was the same with Tails and snow.

The fox wraps his tails around himself and looks up to Sonic, he knew the only way to get his mind off the environment around him was to have a conversation with Sonic, and he knew exactly what to talk about. When Selim disappeared, everyone was sad; however it wasn't like a normal mourning, not like when Dr. Quack or the other Freedom Fighters died during the evacuation. It was an eerie silence, a shrouded mystery which seemed to encompass a lot of the silence. Maybe it was because that they had come close to dying themselves. Even himself, that white light that enveloped everything almost caught him, and Sonic would have went with him if it hadn't halted. Tails looked up to Selim, as a brother, and though he did take his Tornado, he did give it back. Sonic seemed to hate him, but when he died… he did seem kinda depressed. So he guessed it would be a good topic to take his mind off the cold and snow. "Sonic do you really think Selim… is dead?"

Sonic was amongst the few who could most acurrately answer that question. That bright light was Chaos Control, and Selim was not in this time anymore… the hedgehog hoped that the older Tails made it back to his time, knowing that he had succeeded in changing time for the better. They would never truly know what happened to Selim. Those that didn't know who he was or where he came from each had their own conclusions. Some had hoped that he was still alive, while others knew that getting the hopes up that someone was alive was usually just a cruel torture, so they said that he was dead. Sally, Knuckles, and himself followed those that said he was dead, just for simplicity's sake. They didn't need to get everyone worried about the possibility of time travel. It would be best that the ability of Chaos Control were kept secret, so it didn't fall into the wrong hands. He noticed that his little bud was looking up to him for an answer so he nodded. "Yeah, he was a great guy… I wish I hadn't been so mean to him. I didn't know…" He then caught himself as he realized he was about to say 'he was my best friend'.

"Know what Sonic?" Tails said as he frowned lightly.

The hedgehog thought for a second. "That he was real… I thought Robotnik was trying to get to me, but it turned out that my anger and blindness made me loose track of the real threat…" He stopped for a second, realizing what he just did. He did what he tried to avoid doing all of his life. Bearing his true feelings to the fox, all this time he showed him false confidence and now there was no taking it back.

Tails looked up at Sonic and nodded, it was strange hearing such seriousness from the hedgehog, such sincerity. "I didn't think there would be anyone like me out there. Life's so cruel, people are taken away so quickly, I never got a chance to know him…" He stops a minute as he thinks he hears something. "Sonic? You hear that?" The fox asks looking about.

Sonic stops walking and looks around. "What is it big guy?"

The fox doesn't respond, but peers into the distance. He then spotted a deep grey near the horizon. "Right there!" He cried as he pointed. He started running up to it, Sonic followed, noting that they were still following the trail. As they got closer they could make out what it was.

The young Miles took to the skies in order to obtain a better view. They both made out a robot heading for the volcano's crater with an elder in a glass cylinder on it's back. They both charged for the robot,

"Sonic, it's one of those birds, the robot has a Flicky!" The fox shouted down to his comrade.

"I see 'im big guy. He's not getting away." The hedgehog blasted forward.

The mountaintop being so windy caused the robot's sensors to be deaf to the approaching hedgehog, only when the creature was about five feet from it did the sound input pick up a threatening noise approaching from behind. The metal contraption was only able to turn half way around before the blue hedgehog smacked right into its side sending it flying a few feet.

When the robot came to rest in a nearby snow bank, Sonic stopped and his two-tailed friend landed next to him. The robot was quick to activate balance servos and stand up straight again, this time facing its opponents.

"Man, takes a lickin' and keeps on tickin'." Sonic said with a smile… "Time to finish this off with a little spin and win."

Right before the hedgehog could take action, the robot lifted its arms, which form large hammers. The hedgehog had to laugh at that. "Yeah right, good luck hitting me with those monsters, bolt-brains."

It wasn't programmed to laugh, though if it could have let out even a chuckle it would have done so. Hitting the hedgehog was not his intension. As the wind blew across the snow a light blue could underneath the ice sheet where the creatures were standing. It swung its hammers with all of its might toward the ground.

Sonic instantly realized what was occurring as a cracking sound could be heard. They were on a frozen lake! He stood still as the cracks in the ice advanced upon them.

Tails seeing the predicament tried to start to fly, but found it was far too cold to lift off the ground without a little running start. As he stepped forward he slipped on the slick ice, falling on his stomach just as the ice around him shattered, he cried out for help as the ice slab started to tip under his weight and the fox slid into the water.

The hedgehog spun around quickly and then forgot about the robot as his friend was in trouble. He ran over, watching his footing on the ice, careful not to slip into the freezing water himself. The goon robot decided to make this distraction his get away, his mission was not to kill them, its primary objective was to get the elder to Snivley's base in the volcano.

The escaping robot was also not Sonic's main concern at the moment, his friend was far more important then any mission. Tails was holding on as best as he could his fingers were already numbing from the cold, he couldn't feel any of his limbs that were below the waters surface. He cried, the tears freezing in his fur about half way down his cheeks. As Sonic reached him he noted that there was solid ground right to the side of where the kit was clinging. This was a lucky break for the hedgehog, it would have been tricky to try and pull the kit out without slipping or falling in with the fox. He looks up quickly to see if the robot was still there, it was already gone, probably could move much faster when it needed to.

"Hang on big guy… I'll have you out in a Sonic-second." He says as he wraps his hand around the kit's arm. "Hold on to my arm if you can manage…" He instructed his friend.

Tails nodded weakly, his gloved hand wrapping around the hedgehog's wrist as best as it could. Sonic drew his weight back. The kitsune kicked his feet and waved his tails to help get him out of the water, though if they actually moved he didn't know because he couldn't feel them.

A few more tugs and the fox gradually got out of the freezing water, but he still could hardly move as the chilling wind blew down upon him. His entire body felt like it was freezing over. Sonic helped him up and looked concernedly at him. They had to get out of the cold, or Tails would come down with hypothermia.

"They said this was a volcano, so if we head to the top, it'll be warmer up there." He said, following the robots tracks as fast as he could. He didn't care that the robot was long gone with the elder. They could always rescue the bird later, right now Tails's life was the most imminent. Not only because it was his friend, also because it was the Freedom Fighter's code. 'Lives before mission', and 'A life in more imminent peril over those who'll be in peril later on'. Though he didn't pay attention to those rules that much, they were just guidelines anyway, even Sally had bent them sometimes. He usually got a kick when she did.

He looked into the distance and saw something rising on the horizon. It seemed to be a steam of some sort, like a mist, as he got closer he noted that there was looked like what seemed to be a pond. Tails was leaning on the hedgehog's shoulders, he wasn't talking much, which was not a good sign, the poor kit disliked ice enough and now this happens. The fox's eyes open as he is helped into what apparently looked like a hot spring of some kind. As the water washed over the fox, he felt his body at first become very numb at the sudden change in temperature. After a few second his body tingled as the feeling started to come back and the kit got used to the warmth. Sonic decided to take a break too; he would have to wait for tails to get better anyway.

The kit looked into the steaming water and sighed. "I'm sorry Sonic…" He said simply, looking very disappointed in himself.

Sonic shook his head. "No need to apologize Tails, we all get caught off our guard, just be glad we're ok."

"I blew it big time though," He said, apparently ignoring the hedgehog's attempt to forgive him. "Because of me, the elder was captured, and now who knows what's gonna happen to him."

Sonic nodded and smiled. "You're very noble little bro, but remember what we went over in our training? Us Freedom Fighters have to stick together, and I couldn't let anything happen to a fellow Freedom Fighter. Ol' Buttnik probably won't touch a feather on that bird's head, because he needs them alive to use in his plan."

Tails nodded. "I really hate the cold though…"

Sonic chuckled. "Yeah, we don't have to be in it much longer now I think."

The fox looked up the mountain side. "Aunt Sally told me that hot springs form from magma being just under the surface, means we must be close."

Sonic nodded in response. "See, where would I be without your smarts… I probably would have gotten lost back at the ruins."

Tails almost forgot about that, and he giggled. "Nah, I'm sure you would have found out eventually… I'm feeling better now, we should get moving, before old Robuttnik gets what he came for."

Sonic smiled climbing out of the springs. "Alright big guy, ready when you are."

As the young vulpine got out of the warm water, the hedgehog looked to the mountain's peak, around the rim there was no snow. What awaited them in that mountain? He knew it'd be a big mission, but with Tails here it wouldn't be a problem… unless his friend were to be captured, or come into peril again. For a moment he wished he had listened to Sal, maybe this mission should have been done solo. The risk was very great, but he wouldn't let anything happen to him. He had made a promise.

"Out of the freezer and into the oven it looks like Tails…." The hedgehog stated.

The fox nods. "Without even an opportunity to thaw."

But what the two friends didn't see as they made their way into toward the volcano was a spybot in the sky, watching them with great mallace.

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That's it for this update, this summer is coming to a close real fast. The next update will be 3 weeks from now on July 29th. Once again I thank you for all the support and honesty. There are alot of twists coming up shortly, just a warning.


	6. Villanous Volcano Valley

There was a brief pause in the images of the past the figure said he had forgotten... the older fox had a question on his mind since he saw his younger self and Sonic talking in the icey plain.

"So, did Sonic ever tell me?" The older two tailed fox asked the mysterous figure.

**"Of what?" **The figure responded.

It was hard to word it, but Selim did his best with it. "That I was... well... me."

**"As I have told you before you don't have to ask questions such as that. They will answer themselves in time. Let's continue..."**

VVVVVVV 

Snively waited, as impatiently as ever, for the last elder to arrive. "What could be taking that miserable bucket of bolts so long?" The human asked as he looked toward the machine he had built to achieve his goal of time travel. It had a square platform with a circular frame in the center, the elders, were to be held in cylinders at each of the four corners on the platform. Three of them were already there; Snively wished that that slow robot would hurry up with that fourth one.

"Target acquired sir." A robotic call came from behind the human. The short pointy-nosed man spun around to see the robot, with the final elder in tow. "At last…" He laughed with his crazy cackle. "Soon I'll go to the past and destroy that miserable hedgehog, along with my insane uncle, and I shall rule this miserable planet without any opposition."

The birds look upon the human with anger, and fear, wishing that someone would come to save them, but they didn't think anyone would. This human had come in with a great many robots, and none of their people would be able to stand up to them, it would take an army and then some to get through them.

* * *

The army of two was now at the top of the volcano's creator. The fox and hedgehog looked down the side of the mountain; they could see the ocean on all sides. "Wow, this is really up here." Came Sonic's voice.

"Yeah, sure is." The kit responded, he wasn't afraid of heights at all, in fact he loved them, he was just happy to get out of the snow the feeling starting to come back to his furry toes. "It looks as if the volcano is about to go dormant."

The hedgehog cocked his head. "It's what?"

The fox sighed and shook his head; 'dormant' would never be part of Sonic's vocabulary. "Most of the magma in there looks cooled off; it looks like the volcano is going to 'sleep'. There are still some lava pools though… we'll have to watch our step Sonic."

"Tails? Are you telling moi to be careful?" the hedgehog retorted with a laugh. "You're soundin' more and more like Sal all the time little bro. You feelin' alright?"

The young vulpine sighed lightly. "I'm just being cautious Sonic. We still have to find Buttnik's base."

"10-4 big guy," Sonic said nodding once. "Nichole can probably help us with that."

The hedgehog whipped out the gadget and it started to evaluate the request. After a series of blips and processing sounds Nicole had come out with the response. "High concentrations of metallic alloys have been located in this proximity." After the data had been processed, a map projected out of the machine with a map of the valley, a blinking grey dot displayed on it.

"Nicole… I couldn't understand a thing you said." The hedgehog whined, scratching behind his ear.

"It probably means that the blinking grey dot is where the base is Sonic." Tails translated.

"Oh… I knew that…" Sonic smiled and he started to make his way down into the valley, Tails followed behind, knowing that the hot air would not make it any easier to use his tails to fly since hot air is thin.

* * *

"Wait up, Sonic!" The kit cried as they had made their way closer to the base. It didn't take too long to get there, with the speed they were traveling. The hedgehog smiled as Tails was right behind him, trying to catch up. He turned around to see that the grey dot on the computer's screen showed that they were almost on top of the base. He ducked behind a pile of dried magma. Tails saw that Sonic had stopped and changed his course to join his friend in what apparently was supposed to be a hiding spot, or look out point of some kind.

As Sonic peeked over the crevice, his friend did so as well. The base was nearly invisible; it was obviously made out of heat resistant alloys for it to be laying in such a hot area. The tracks of robots could be seen coming to and from the structure.

"It looks as if they took the elders in there." The hedgehog stated, to which his vulpine partner nodded. Sonic turned to the fox. "I'm gonna go check it out Tails, maybe find a way in, could you watch my back?" He asked.

Tails was a bit hesitant, but then nodded, at least Sonic was thinking for once, this seemed good a plan as any. "Ok Sonic." He stated as he took a pair of binoculars the hedgehog handed him. The fox instantly realized them as the gift he received on his 9th birthday. He used them a lot but lost them when he turned 11. He thought they had burnt with Knothole. He smiled up at the hedgehog.

"I knew I could count on you Tails, you've always been a great lookout." Sonic said smiling back.

With that the hedgehog ran down the ridge to the base, hiding in any crevice he could find. As the kit looked trough his binoculars he got this strange déjà vu feeling.

* * *

"_Why can't I go?" The ten year old kit whined to the hedgehog. The air was dry, the sky dark in color. _

"_Too dangerous down there… Hey! Freedom Fighters always follow orders, Right?" Sonic asked with a smile._

_The fox nodded returning the smile, "Right." He said as the hedgehog left with an 'outta here'. The blast from the sheer speed caused the vulpine's fur to ruffle lightly. The fox picked up his binoculars and looked through them as the hedgehog went behind a ledge. Then suddenly he saw something, to which he gasped to himself. Swatbots were closing in behind the hedgehog…_

"_Sonic… Oh no…"_

_

* * *

_

Tails remembered those days well, some things didn't change. More so then the kit thought as he suddenly spotted two metallic forms close in behind the hedgehog… "Sonic…" He gasped; getting ready to fly and warn Sonic.

His namesakes whirled as he was about to lift off the ground when he had another recollection from that day.

* * *

_"Sonic, watch out!" The kitsune yelled down the cliff to the spying hedgehog._

_As the blue one turned around though, he didn't look to the two swatbot that were close behind, he was instead looking to the ten year old kit with a fearful stare. Tails was kind of confused as to wat. Suddenly he flew forward without the use of his appendages and he knew he was captured._

_

* * *

_

He was later rescued by Sonic, it didn't surprise him, but he did feel bad that he let himself be taken like that. It was very embarrassing and he wouldn't let it happen again.

He shook his head as he looked over his shoulder, there was nothing behind him, and he had to hurry up before… Sonic… he looked into his binoculars again… it was too late; a swatbot had him unconscious and was dragging him into the base. "SONIC! NO!"

The fox burst out of his hiding spot running with all his might as his friend was dragged into the complex. As the robot entered the facility the door swooshed shut. Tails was so close to the door that he couldn't stop himself from hitting it. When the fox noted he was going to slam into the door, he put his gloved hand out in front of him to stop himself from smacking square into it. He hit the door with a smack, the impact throwing him back a bit, but if he had not put his hand out if could have been much worse.

As Tails stood in silence before the door everything seemed to go cold, it all felt surreal. He really blew it bad this time. Sonic trusted him to watch his back, and now he was captured. What was he going to do?

The young kit pounded on the metal door with his gloved fist, over and over again. The fox knew he could count on Sonic if he. himself, was ever in danger... but now the shoe was on the other foot. He never ever dreamed of being in such a tough position, and it was a task he couldn't imagine how to accomplish. "Take me instead…" Tails cried as his arm became tired from pounding so hard. He sniffled as he turned around. His mind raced his felt his blood run cold. If anything happened to his best friend, it'd be all his fault. He would never forgive himself.

What was he going to do? Maybe he could fly back to get the other Freedom Fighters to help. The fox sighed. No, that would take too long. By the time they got back… Sonic could be dead, or robotisized. He couldn't just go charging into the facility, that would be suicide, and he wouldn't help Sonic by getting captured. He looked up into the sky and asked the wind. "Sonic, what should I do?"

There was a sudden blip that broke the vulpine's thoughts. The fox looked down by his foot and noticed that Nicole was on the ground, Sonic must have dropped it when he was rendered unconscious. He crouched down and picked it up; it looked as if it wasn't damaged by the fall. It was a strange sensation having it in his hands. As long back as he could remember Sally would never let him touch it, whether it was because he could break it, lose it, or mess with its programming he would never know.

"Nichole?" He asked seemingly without thought, just something to break the silence.

The computer responded with. "Voice print unidentified, please state your name."

"Um… Tails." The fox responded.

After a second of processing the computer came up with, "One alias matched 'Tails', are you Miles 'Tails' Prower."

The fox was surprised it would know him through nickname; he knew Nichole was full of data, but it was still sometimes creepy. "Yes." He responded.

A few more blips. "New user: Miles "Tails" Prower confirmed, please enter voice password."

Tails thought for a moment and came with the first thought that ran to his mind. It was his wish to save Sonic, and in order to do so he'd have to quickly become the best freedom fighter he could, soaring higher then he ever had before. His other feeling was how afraid he was, and how much he just wanted to run back to his plane.

Through all these thoughts and feelings only one phrase could describe what he was feeling. "I wanna fly." He stated.

"Password received, welcome Miles Prower."

With that his course was set. Sonic's life and the future itself was in his hands. He would not let them down, not Sonic, or the Freedom Fighters. If he failed, he'd never be able to live with himself. A sudden after thought hit the fox.

"Nichole… call me Tails."

"You got it."

0000000000000000000000

Sorry this one was a bit late, life caught up with me a bit today. Anyways this will probably be the shortest chapter in the whole thing, the next update will be on August 19th and will be the last 'summer season update' that means the chapters afterward will be put up on a regular basis.


	7. Gene Gadget Grit

"We gotta get inside Nichole" Tails states in a light panic. Every second that he spent out here was another second Sonic was in danger. Looking around, he noticed a little touch pad next to the door that his hedgehog friend was dragged through. Moving closer to it, it looked a little to complicated for his technical ability… maybe the little palm computer could help.

"Can you hack it Nicole?" Tails asked.

"Affirmative…" The machine responded in its usual monotone voice.

He holds it up to the keypad. "Hack it…" he ordered.

"Crackin' Tails." The computer responded, to which Tails couldn't help but chuckle, the little gadget had defiantly been in Sonic's hands too long. A second later of blips and beeps the door suddenly opened with an 'access granted' calling out.

"Way past…" Tails said as he snuck into the door.

Deep in the futuristic base, a pointy nosed human looked over his dimensional transport, it was quite a piece of work if he did say so himself. Even his uncle would be marveled at the capabilities it had. It wasn't just any transport; it had also the ability to move through each different dimension. The second, third, and even the fourth dimension were his to explore, every point up down and in between. Of course, he'd be using it's fourth dimension feature, which would enable him to travel through time. The other two would prove pretty much useless, he pretty much owned this planet already, except for where those fur balls were hiding. If he went back in time he could make sure the freedom fighters would never be a nuisance to him now.

"Snively sir, we have positive news." Came a robotic call, interrupting the human's thoughts.

The vertically challenged one turned around, lightly fuming to himself. Why did these contraptions choose the most inopportune time to interrupt him? "What do you want?" He sighed.

"It's about the hedgehog, sir." The robot responded instantly perking the humanoid's interest. Anything concerning the hedgehog was defiantly something that required his full attention; he had come too far now to be stopped.

"What about him?" he asked lowly to the metallic soldier.

"We have captured him." It responded.

With those four simple words the mood of the pointy nosed human suddenly shifted to something a little more positive. "Very good," he said with a sly grin on his face. "Where is he now?"

The door to the chamber opens as if one cue, a rodent struggling in the grip of a swatbot that entered through the opening.

"Well, well, well… what do we have here?" Snively chuckled his low signature laugh with the funny squeals.

The hedgehog, even though captured and he couldn't really move, let a grin out at the short man. "What's the matter? Is the big man too little to face me himself?" He asks with a laugh.

When Snively figures out who the hedgehog is talking about he lets off a shrill laugh, he knew he was good, but he didn't know how he was able to fool the Freedom Fighters for so long. He smiles, it shouldn't matter if he let the hedgehog in on his little secret, he wouldn't live to tell the others. As soon as he was done in the past there wouldn't be any others anyway. "Oh my dear, dear hedgehog… You still think that Robotnik is alive?"

"Are you off your knocker Sniv? Or did you just hit your head to much as a kid?" Sonic asked with a little annoyance in his voice. "Your kind uncle has been causing a rukus over the past few years. You never saw the Death Egg?"

Snively had another chuckle at the hedgehog's expense. "Oh my dear boy… of course I saw the Death Egg… I'm the one that had made it operational, and used it."

Sonic stopped shifting around in the robot's grip and just stared at the pointy nosed human. "What are you talking about Snootley?"

Sighing, the human shook his head. "You'd never figure it out hedgehog, so I'll just tell you what I mean." Snively stated as he moved over to his chair and sat down to make himself comfortable while he explained. "When you destroyed the Doomsday Project you knew my uncle was in the area when it was destroyed. You Freedom Fighters probably assumed he was dead, but never found a body, as I never had." He smiled.

"Get to the point while I'm young Sniffley…" The hedgehog said very annoyed with being told about the stuff he already knew.

"You remember those Robotnik Clones you encountered in the Sky Sanctuary?" Snively asked.

The hedgehog nodded, they were launched from the Death Egg as it made its way to the upper stratosphere. They were obvious copies, because they had a chrome top, ironically making them official chrome domes. They had jetpacks and laser guns and tried to slow him down. They were slow and clumsy however and he easily destroyed them.

Seeing the nod Snively continued. "Let's just say those were the failed experiments… you see Robotnik disappeared after what happened at Doomsday. Just like the older Tails did after he fought Uncle Chuck…"

Sonic growls as he finally puts two and two together. "It was you this whole time? The Death Egg, the burning of the Great Forest, my Uncle Chuck, it was all you? You bastard, how could you?"

Snively just grinned. "Just for the name calling I'm gonna make sure you suffer a horribly slow and painful end. Take the rodent to the garbage compacting unit, and make sure he put him in feet first. That way he'll be able to feel himself being crushed, slowly." He laughed.

Sonic growled to himself. Tails, if you're out there you'd better hurry, he thought.

The fox peeked around the corner, the coast was clear, which was strange how quiet it was. Maybe they didn't think anyone was with Sonic. Maybe it was that they didn't see him as a threat and had all the security around the hedgehog. Either way they were making this way too easy. He had to slow down Robotnik, now doubt he'd be using the elders in his evil scheme, and he also had Sonic who would be either ready to kill him, or robotosize him.

As he made his way down the corridor there was a little sign that caught his eye that said 'Power Room'. He smiled to himself, it was time to have a little fun.

The hedgehog found himself stuck to a conveyor belt in a very musty room. Megamuck covered him like a blanket, he couldn't move an inch.

"Any last words rodent?" Sneered Snively as he flipped the switch to turn the unit back on, the blue hero moving slowly toward a rotating stubbed wheel made to grind and compact anything unfortunate to get caught in it.

Sonic growled at the humanoid as he made his way down the belt. "You'll never get away with this Tails will stop you." He shouted, and then instantly was silent realizing he just gave his buddy away.

The pointy nosed one laughs. "If you mean that little twerp then I have nothing to worry-" he was interrupted when suddenly the room became swallowed in darkness. There was a moment of silence which was ended when Sonic let out a laugh.

"You were saying Snootley?" came the rodent's voice in the darkness.

The backup lights clicked on as the hedgehog let out an inward sigh of relief, the belt had stopped for the moment and he had more time to try and loosen himself from the muck.

"Repairbots to the power room immediately!" Snively shouted a growl in his voice. If the power remained cut then his teleportation devise would fail to charge. He wasn't about to lose his dream of conquest because of some stupid little flea-ridden furball.

The kit chuckled to himself as he saw repair bots bolting into the power room. It'd probably take them at least ten minutes to sift through the mess he made, which was plenty of time to find Sonic, and hopefully the elders. Tails was easily able to hack into the system, it was as if Snively hadn't prepared for an intrution as he had before. It was very strange that the short man was able to make schematics for cloning his fat uncle, but the fox was able to find schematics for them. Looking over the security video records, it was obvious that the man behind this was Snively. He had to tell Sonic of this, but first he had to find him.

"Hey Nichole, can you bring up the base schematic we got?" Tails asked, and instantly a hologram image of the base layout came up. Luckily he thought of searching through the database for a map of some kind before he trashed the power grid.

"Alright Nicole, now where's Sonic?" The fox asked.

The computer searched a bit and found it rather quickly, there wasn't many creatures to sift through in this area. A blue dot blinked on a point on the schematic and then the machine started to translate. "First take a left, then a-"

"It's ok Nichole, I can read a map." Tails said with a laugh. Nichole had definitely been around his friend far too long.

Hold on Sonic, the fox thought to himself, I'll be there in a second.

Sonic pulled against the muck with all of his might, but it was of no use, he couldn't reach the power ring he had stuffed in his pack. This mega muck was the good quality stuff, if he could only reach the power ring though it wouldn't stand a chance.

Suddenly there was a flash of light and a whirling noise, the power was back on! The conveyor belt had started to move again, and the hedgehog tugged with renewed vigor.

The intercom cracked, and the shrill voice that could only belong to Snively spoke. "I'd love to stay and watch your demise rodent, but I have a date with the past, and don't want to miss it."

Tails heard the voice and gasped, he had to hurry, everything was happening so fast.

Sonic sighed and stopped struggling, he was out of strength. His breath was heavy as he found himself hoping that Tails would be ok, where ever he was. As the clanking of the crushing compactor started to get louder and louder in his ears he closed his eyes. This was truly the end… he tried to get his mind on something else however the grinding sound continually got louder and louder as he inched closer.

Geez, simple mode editing isn't working, my HTML is minimal at best. I'll have to put seperations in once FF gets the Simple mode fixed. Sorry this one was short, getting ready to go back to school, and it's not easy since this ones farther away. My next update will be on September 9th, and will be the last one for the summer, so they ought to get better. Let me know what you think, even though this chapter was under par IMO. It'll get better from this point onward.


	8. Purge Puppet Panic

"Sonic!" The cry rang out causing the hedgehog to jump a bit, as he wasn't expecting to hear another voice. The hedgehog opened his eyes and looked over to see Tails standing there. He sighed in relief. He thought he was a goner.

"Tails?" the hedgehog looked up with a light surprise, he hoped that his bud wouldn't let him down. "Hurry up and get me out of here, bro."

The fox nodded and quickly analyzed the situation. Sonic was very close to being crushed by the garbage compactor so he had to find something he could use to stop the belt, and soon. A large compartment below the moving belt caught the kit's attention he could hear a clanking noise coming from it. Swiftly, he moved up to the hatch and popped it open and knew he hit the bull's-eye. Inside the compartment, gears and parts moved and whirled, these were obviously the pieces moving the belt, sabotaging this would be child's play.

Out of the corner of his eye the fox spotted a lead pipe leaning on the corner wall. That would be perfect. He ran over to it and picked it up, then quickly moved back to the gears.

The hedgehog looked up to see what was taking his friend so long and saw the lead pipe in his hand. "Hold on Tails the –" He was about to say, but was cut off by a sharp grinding noise as the fox shoved the piping in between a few gears causing the belt to come to an abrupt halt. Sonic saw some smoke go up to the ceiling indicating that his friend had succeeded in jamming the contraption. "-switch is over there…" he finished with a sigh shaking his head.

The fox looked over his shoulder and now noted a big red button labeled 'EMERGANCY STOP'. He felt himself blush in embarrassment and chuckled a bit to himself. "Opps… Guess I kinda missed that. That's what I get from learning from ya I guess."

The blue rodent lets out a sarcastic laugh. "Ha, ha… very funny bro, now could you get me outta this gook?" He said letting out a true laugh.

"Oh… Sure thing Sonic." Tails said with a nod and moved onto the belt. He pulled at the hedgehog with all of his might, even using his tails for additional leverage. Though no matter how hard he tried to get him out of the muck, it was no use, his friend was stuck on there tightly. "Man, he must have used the top quality stuff."

Sonic sighed, "Laying here really is boring." He sighed as the fox thought of another was to free his friend. He then remembered something, when Uncle Chuck captured him and Antoine that one time he used Mega Muck to keep them still, and even gave the ingredients as he made them… some petroleum, some quick sand, and some clay mud… if he could find a way to heat the stuff up, it would lose it's stickiness from the clay mud and it would crumble easily. The place ought to have air conditioning and heaters, and with the power back online he'd easily be able to manipulate the conditions.

"Hold on Sonic, I'll be right back." He said as he made his way quickly out of the room, but stopped at the door. "I'm gonna warn ya though it's gonna a little hot in here." He stated as he left the room, leaving the hedgehog alone.

The hedgehog sighs, "All this waiting is giving me a headache." He whined.

* * *

The fox made his way into the maintenance room, once again the security was very light… he only had to deactivate two guards which were protecting the compactor room. He could guess that whatever Snively was up to, he probably had the guards with him so the malevolent human could complete his plans. He had to hurry and get Sonic out of that muck, every second wasted was another Snively had to return to the past and make a mess of things.

"There must be something for temperature control here…" Tails stated as he looked about the room. "Bingo." He smiled as he found a terminal labeled 'Environment Control'. He took out the palm computer and placed it near the mainframe.

"All right Nicole, do your thing."

"Affirmative." The computer stated as it made some random noises for a minute. "Access Granted."

"Cool… er, or hot… whichever." The kitsune said with a laugh.

He sifted through the different segments of the Environment Control system trying to find like a 'Garbage Room' or something by that name, it unfortunately wasn't in alphabetical order, and there were fifty segments, talk about a chore. As he combed through, though, he noticed something strange about one of the labels.

"External Holographic Environment?" He asks himself "What the heck…? Does that mean what I think it does?"

He turned off the EHE and looked around to see if there were any windows or any screens with outside camera shots. The fox spotted one on a terminal marked 'Outside: Sector C' and looked to see what he had anticipated. It was all a light grey hue and not deep red as before, all the lava that was there before had dried up and there were no wavy lines of heat. This volcano was still dormant; all the lava was an illusion. It was probably meant to scare away interlopers, too bad it failed. Tails wondered if Snively knew that the volcano was probably going to awaken, it would make sense because of the hot spring he and Sonic were in earlier, it was ironic in a way.

The fox suddenly shook his head remembering that he was here to help Sonic. He looked about for the controls for the compactor room… "Of course… it's the last one on the list." The kit laughs as he changes the settings.

* * *

Back in the garbage compactor room the hedgehog started to feel himself sweat. It felt as if he were outside in the volcano's heat again. What was Tails trying to do, he wondered, make him sweat to death? Then he realized the muck start to stiffen up a bit, and it hurt a little as it changed in texture forming almost cast-like around his body. Sonic pushed up at the now not so mucky mixture and it cracked apart, freeing him from its grasp.

"Way to go Tails…" He said to himself as he started to brush off some of the dry substance that stuck to him.

"Thanks Sonic." Came the fox's voice from the doorway causing the blue one to jump a bit.

"Jeez big guy don't sneak up on me like that!" The blue one said with a laugh.

"Sorry Sonic."

The hedgehog shook his head. "Don't be, I owe you big time."

Tails laughed. "Don't worry about is Sonic, you saved me a bunch of times."

Sonic nodded in response. "Guess we're even then."

"Nah, I still owe you about a dozen." The kit responded, shaking his head.

"…You actually kept count?" Sonic laughed.

There was a small silence before Sonic spoke up again. "Snively is behind this whole operation…"

"I know Sonic, I spotted that in the data files, apparently he got careless. He didn't encode his information this time."

Sonic scratched the back of his head. "You actually read through those things?"

Tails nodded, "I figured I should while I was in there."

Sonic laughed. "I better be sure I stick 'round ya more or you'll become too much like a Sal."

The fox shrugged and was about to ask what was wrong with that when the lights suddenly dimmed heavily, probably from an energy surge. They then flickered back to full brightness.

They both looked out the door and recalled something; Snively was still out there and was still in the midst of completing his project. They looked to each other and nodded.

"Come on Tails, let's get this show on the road." The hedgehog stated to which his bud nodded.

The fox flipped open Nichole and it displayed the layout of the base they had taken earlier.

"So which way is it to Snootley, Nichole?" The hedgehog asks. A light blinked onto the schematic making Sonic tap his foot. "Meaning…"

"Go left, then right, then down the stairs, then to the left…" Tails said before the machine could let out anything.

"Correct." Nicole replied.

The hedgehog blinked and the then scratched the back of his head. "You really are starting to scare me big guy…" Sonic said with a smile.

"Sorry." He said with a laugh.

"Would you stop apologizing? I didn't really mean it," Sonic said shaking his head. "Now lets go Tails, we're gonna warp seven." He said, moving out of the room and ready to shoot off, the fox ready to follow when there was a pause. "Uh, which way are we going again?" The hedgehog asked, causing his friend to sigh.

* * *

Snively stood in awe as the portal continued to gather power. The machine let of a loud roar as it was finally was fully charged. This was almost too easy, the pointy nosed human thought to himself, he couldn't believe the difficulty that his uncle had in conquering his adversaries, it was almost pathetic.

"Now open the portal!" He cried out into the room. The computer bleeped and the birds in the containers shrilled as a charge shot through them, causing their powers to shoot through the center of the machine and a strange colorful hue materialized. The short man's eyes lit up in the color of the hole in space. "This is it, everything in this universe, even time, belongs to me."

"Not so fast, sniffsley!" Came the voice the human had come to loathe.

Snively frowned as he turned around. "I thought I killed you, you miserable hedgehog, how did you get out?"

The two tailed kitsune stepped out from behind Sonic and into the light causing the little man to glare. "So it was the little twerp, huh? Well you're both too late, in a matter of seconds none of you will have ever existed."

"What are you talking about Snively?" The hedgehog leered at the human.

The man smiled wickedly, "I'm going to do what your friend 'Selim' did, and travel back to the past." He said with a shrill laugh, he looked at the kitsune as he said the name of the older Miles.

"Sonic, what is he talking about?" The fox asked

The hedgehog sighed, why did Snootley have to open his big mouth? He knew he had to tell Tails everything now; he'd rather he told them then the midget human. "Bro… Selim was from the future, he got lost in time…"

The fox was shocked, why did Sonic hold that from him? "Why didn't you tell me this before?" he asked, a little bit of hurt could be heard in his voice. Sonic never held such things back from him before, that he was aware of.

"The thing is…" Sonic began; he paused a bit trying to think of an excuse, he couldn't tell him who Selim was, because if he did, it could change a lot of things.

"Oh would you two shut up, it won't matter in a moment anyway!" The short human interrupted as he backed toward the gate, "Farewell, my adversaries." He laughed.

Tails then noted something strange, as Snively was just inches away from the gate the hue changed, from a light blue to a deeper purple, just as he was about to enter. The human then stepped in with a final laugh. The fox pondered over what just happened to cause such a change, and what it could possibly mean when suddenly a blur shot into his vision.

"No you don't!" Sonic cried as he shot toward the portal, which was closing.

"Sonic, wait!" The fox cried, but he was not heard as his friend entered the portal just as it disappeared. There was a silence as Tails suddenly found himself standing alone in the room. The lights were dim, and his cry of 'wait' echoed in the emptiness. It was so sudden that the realization came after his reverberating voice faded. He was gone… Sonic was gone…

000000000

And thus ends another chapter, and now it is time that the updates become more frequent again, good new for you. Also another cool thing is that I don't have to come up with any more alliterations for the chapters, yay! Anyways the next update will be here September 23rd. When you'll find out if Sonic truely is gone for good.


	9. Disrupted Plans

"Sonic…" Tails said feeling numb as the machine stood before him, deadly silent.

"That stupid hedgehog," a voice came from behind the fox with a light echo to it. Tails turned around to see that it belonged to one of the elders; the green bird was relatively large in size and looked like it'd be a miracle if it could fly. "He wasn't supposed to follow; now he's stuck in the Void too."

The fox bolted to the cylinder that contained the talking bird. "What do you mean? What's the Void?"

The bird was obviously caught off guard, "How did you know what I said?"

Tails looked to the palm gadget that was still in his hand, but noticed it was in sleep mode. That was strange, how did he understand what was said?… but that's not important now, Sonic was in trouble. "Who cares how… what is the Void?"

But the bird remained silent for awhile as he noted the vulpine's two tails. As Tails saw what the big green bird was staring at, he became impatient. "So I have two tails? So what? Answer my question!" he shouted.

The Elder shook his head. "It's not that… anyway the Void is a space between the third and fourth dimensions… like a fractal is between the first and second." The fox scratched his head as the bird continued to describe the Void and the one that discovered it and also was trapped there, Nagus.

* * *

Snively looked around himself, this wasn't where he had planned to go, everywhere around him was nothing but swirling on a purple hue. He recognized it almost immediately as the Void. 

"Noo…!" he cried, his anger echoing off of the walls of nothingness.

"Awww… what's the matter Snootly?" A voice came from behind the human. "Take a wrong turn?"

Snively turned around to see that it was his nemesis and he laughed. "So it looks like we're all stuck in here, what an ironic end."

Sonic laughs, "Well at least I can rest easy knowing Tails, Sal, and the others can now have peace. And it's all thanks to your machine Sniffs. Here I thought you were more cleaver then your unc. Guess I was foolin' myself."

"What was that rodent?" The human growled.

"Ooo… is big scary sniffles gonna hurt me with his big mechanical army?... Oh wait, that's back on Mobius… sorry 'bout that."

The pointy nosed human cried out in anger as he lunged at the hedgehog, but the speedy blue hero was too quick and easily dodged the attack. Sonic chuckled. "Oh this is gonna be tons of fun, now I can torment you for all eternity."

"Not if I don't kill you first hedgehog!" The nasal shout came in return. Sonic smiled and was about to dodge another incoming attack when he suddenly saw a powerful bolt streak across the 'sky' and toward them.

"Watch out!" The blue hedgehog cried, but there wasn't enough time to react as the magical bolt crashed into the ground between the two. The energy from the attack caused the human and hedgehog to fly in opposite directions. Sonic slid across the ground as he finished his decent.

A moment passed before Sonic could move. He reached his hand up to touch his head to make sure it was still there as he sat up. "Where the heck did that come from?" He asked as he groggily rubbed his forehead and looked up.

There was a dark shadow in the air that cut into the deep purple hue of the demented looking sky. Dark red eyes could be seen piercing through the darkness of the shadow, and white fang shaped teeth gleamed as the form smiled. Sonic could instantly recognize who it was.

"Nagus…"

* * *

"I'm going in after him!" Tails cried stubbornly. 

"You're a fool." The green elder said. "In the Void are all the nemesis that brought havoc to Mobius… keeping the portal open could risk having them escape into the world once again! Right now the war could end if they stay in there… Mobius could have true piece for the first time in 12 years… you'd risk it all just for your friend?"

"Of course I would!" Tails said leering at the bird. "I don't know what peace is… and I don't want to if Sonic wasn't there to see it with me. He has worked harder then anyone for it! Even if he has been rash at times, he's been there during the times you thought everything was going to be lost. And I'm going to do the same for him."

"You're still a fool… you're but a child, what could you do?"

Another voice chirped in from another corner of the platform. "More then you could I'm sure Grensfeld." A thinner flicky of red color stated from another container. "You always were more chicken then flicky."

The chubby green flicky glared in response. "If he goes it could cause the end of us all, I'm just saying it's selfish."

"Have faith in the boy why don't you?" An elder of purple color stated its voice more feminine then the other two. "It's our fault his friend is trapped, we at least owe him a chance to rectify our mistakes."

Grensfeld, the green elder, sighed and finally gave in. "Fine… but don't say I didn't warn you guys."

The fox turned to the other flickys and smiled. "Thank you."

A blue one who had remained silent until now chirped in response, "No problem, you have a big heart kid, you should be able to do this no prob." The kit didn't know why, but it reminded him of Sonic.

"Get onto the platform and we'll warp you to around the same spot your friend and enemy were sent." The purple one said.

Tails with a nod approached the machine. "Thanks again, I won't let you down."

"We're sure you won't, good luck to ya." The blue one chirped with a wing-wave.

The vulpine took a deep breath and stepped back into the void. The green one watched the fox disappear into the portal. "He'd better hurry up."

"Oh don't be such a worry-wart Gren…" the blue one sighed. "If he's who I think he is then he'll come through for us."

The green elder looked to the blue one and nodded. "I did notice the two tails, but that doesn't mean he's the one."

The red one laughs a bit. "How many young foxes have two tails? The one we helped in Robotropolis was a lot older though."

"No…" the female elder responded. "They're the same person; the older one probably just traversed the fourth dimension."

"How? Even we have trouble doing that." Grensfeld retorted.

"The only other way I can think of is the Chaos Emeralds."

"In theory!" The green one interrupted. "Don't tell me you believe that Chaos Control hogwash…"

"Well, legends come from somewhere…" The purple bird responded. "How else do you explain it?"

"He probably built some machine, or someone else did," The rotund green bird replied. "Like our pointy nosed friend did here… too bad he failed to account that we still had control over it…"

The others nodded as they looked to the portal waiting for the fox to return with his friend.

* * *

Sonic growled as he felt himself entrapped inside a magical barrier the wizard had placed around him. The hedgehog didn't see the point in it; it wasn't like he was going anywhere anytime soon. He looked over to see that Snively also was ensnared by the wizard's magic. 

"So how did you two enter my domain?" The raspy voice of Nagus asked. "There haven't been any rips open for awhile…"

"Ask needle nose, it's his fault we're here." The hedgehog sighed pointing to the human.

As the wizard looked toward the human he shook his head. "I don't know either… I programmed it so that it would take me to the past…"

Sonic laughed. "Your mistake was keeping those birds with wills of their own; they probably pulled a fast one on you."

"Birds… you mean flickys." Nagus said with a thought. "You should have known better then to search for time travel… it finds you…"

"What are you talking about?" The hedgehog asked scratching his head.

The wizard looked down at the two and laughed. "When things are at their most hectic the jewels of chaos become the greatest power, causing even greater chaos…"

"That sounds familiar…" Sonic said thinking back to the conversation with Knuckles. "Chaos Control?"

The wizard nods and looked as if he were about to speak again when a voice cut into the conversation.

"Sonic!"

The voice was young sounding and the hedgehog could immediately identify it. He shook his head in disbelief. 'Tails didn't follow me', he kept telling himself in denial. However the voice shouted his name again and concluded what the hedgehog feared. "Sonic!" The cry got louder each time.

"Tails, stay away…" Sonic said quietly, but it was too late as the fox flew into the scene. The hedgehog looked around to see what the wizard was doing, but he was gone… this wasn't good. The kit walked up to his trapped friend and noticed the magical barrier.

"What happened Sonic?" Tails asked, and not soon after heard a chuckle come from behind him. He spins around and lets out a little gasp of surprise as he sees and old looking creature with claw hands draped in a robe. "Who… Who are you?"

The wizard shows little emotion as he introduces himself. "I am Nagus. How did you get here?"

The fox expression changes from one of surprise to, one of disgust. "You're Nagus? I've heard of you! You're the one who discovered this place… entrapped by your own greed…"

Nagus laughed. "Those birds never knew how to keep their mouths shut. They also seemed to have been foolish enough to let someone come in here to rescue his friend…" He said glancing at the hedgehog.

"Friendship is something those of evil will never understand." Sonic stated, hoping to keep the wizard more attentive to him and not Tails.

"It's a good thing too," the wizard said with a smirk. "Or like your fox friend here it would have led to my undoing…" He cackled.

"You leave him alone…!" The hedgehog cried.

The wizard scoffed and shot a lightning bolt from the 'sky' at the fox. Tails was unaware of the incoming attack that was coming from behind.

"Tails look out!"

The fox then heard the bolt coming at him and quickly leapt forward just as the attack hit the ground, however he forgot to look where he jumped and the gap between himself and the evil wizard closed. Nagus laughed as the vulpine got closer, and he took advantage of the situation as a claw shot out quickly and caught the fox around the neck in mid jump.

"Tails!" Sonic shouted as the wizard got a firm grip around his friend's neck. "Let him go!"

"Oh I will…" the evil wizard said, "but only if he helps me escape this prison." He grinned as he gripped tighter around fox's neck.

"Why?" The hedgehog asked, "As soon as you leave you'll just start to crystallize, remember?" he pondered as he remembered their first encounter.

"Of course I remember you miserable rodent! I had all the time in the world here to concoct an antidote; all I need are some ingredients in the real world."

A sound of a propeller could be heard and the kitsune chuckled as he was using his tails to lift himself off the ground which relieved the choke hold enough so he could breathe. Tails grinned, "Well smart guy, if you hurt me how am I gonna tell you where the exit is?"

The wizard hesitates for a moment, but then grins as he gets an idea. He tries to control the young ones mind, but there is a barrier, a power blocking him access. Then he realizes as he looks into the kits eye, he knew why he couldn't control the young one… he then smiles. "Very true young Prower… if I'm not mistaken… " the fox's eyes widened, how did he know his name? "If hurting you won't get me results then perhaps it will be the pain of your friend that will help persuade you."

Tails gasped as he heard those words, ensuring Nagus that he had hit a weak point. "No, leave Sonic alone!" The fox cried as the wizard let go of his throat.

"Then you know what to do." The evil magician said simply as he sent electricity to thrash the hedgehog within his prison causing the rodent to scream loudly in pain. Tails couldn't stand to see Sonic like this; the screams reverberated in his head.

"Sonic!"

0000000000000

AN: Now you're wondering why I made the fat green guy the coward and the rest of the thin cast normal. It actually had nothing to do with his bodyweight or coloration for that matter. On the intro screen of Sonic 3D Blast you can see a visual of all four elders when it talks about Flickes. In the gameplay you collect the birds as you go about your business. When you get hit you lose the birds. Each color has a different movement associated with being 'on the loose'.

The green one, moves away from you, and this always ticked me off in the game, so I made him the 'coward' one on that reason. Cause he seemed to be a chicken in the game

Anyways that does it for this update the next one is coming on October 7th, it'll definatly be one not to miss and will tie alot together.


	10. Hidden Power

"S-Sonic!" the kitsune shouted as he continually saw his friend shocked by the wizard's magically bolts. The hedgehog was unable to move, he couldn't escape as the attack paralyzed him. Tails felt like he had to do something, but he also couldn't move. Through all the pain he saw his friend going through he desperately wanted to act, yet something was holding him back. Was it Fear? Helplessness? He didn't know what it was but he found himself standing there, angry at himself and Nagus, as the light from the energy attack caused the kit to tear as his friend cried in plight.

The blue hedgehog saw Tails standing there as he started to lose feeling in his limbs. "T-Tails… get outta here…!" He cried. Sonic didn't like being seen like this, his friend to see his hero being torn apart like he was. As he looked at the fox, he thought he saw something. A shadowy figure approached from behind Tails, it looked like it was another fox, it looked a lot like his two tailed friend, but though it was the same height and build, the shadow only had one tail. Sonic tried to look closer but he felt another shock jolt through him, making him cry out in pain. He opened his eyes again to see the form, it had advanced from the shadow, it looked nothing like tails, and everything like him. Like some strange funhouse mirror.

The form was of the same height, had the same distinguishing features. The same three strands of fur came off the top of the vulpine's brow. Its eyes were of the same shape, as was most the rest of the form's body from, save the single bushy tail. There were some differences in the form other then the tail though, mostly in the mystery fox's coloration. The fur was of a deeper color, a typical brown color compared to his friend's lighter orange. Its eyes were a royal blue compared to the cobalt, lighter eyes of Tails. Sonic did not know why but the mystery form seemed sinister as it stood behind his friend. The form finally made a move after standing behind its two tailed counterpart for awhile, its hand went for the two-tailed fox's shoulder. The hedgehog tried to cry out to his friend to warn him of the form sneaking up behind him, but he couldn't say a word as he felt himself black out.

Shortly after Tails saw Sonic fall he felt something on his shoulder. It felt like a hand, and its touch made him shiver, it felt cold. He was about to look over behind him but he couldn't before he felt the chill spread over him like a blanket enveloping him. He soon felt himself loose all conscience thought.

Nagus, seeing that the hedgehog was unconscious stopped his attack. "Haven't you seen your friend in pain enough? Are you ready to cooperate?"

He turned to look at the fox, but before he could turn fully around he felt a fist smack his square across the face, the assailant was the two tailed kitsune, he obviously hit the right buttons, but never did he suspect the kit to be so foolish as to attack him. The wizard stumbled back a bit and put one of his clawed hands to his face. He looked upon it to see blood that had come from his lip. He growled as he turned back around to face the fox, who was breathing heavily and had tears in his eyes. "You fool… you could have saved you and your friend, now you'll both die…" The wizard shouted as he charge up what seemed like a lethal attack, the color of the Void darkened as a light started to gather around Nagus's claws.

Snively, looking upon the two watched with absolute terror, that little twerp was a fool. He closed his eyes as the light forming at the claws of the aggressive wizard brightened even more, the attack would defiantly tear whatever it hit asunder.

"Now prepare yourself…" the wizard shouted as a bolt flew at the fox with incredible speed. Tails looked toward the attack with anger; a facial expression that seemed unlike him. Before the large energy hit the fox it suddenly stopped, a strong wind kicked up blowing back toward the wizard.

"So the young Prower does show promise…" The wizard laughs with glee. "But you're just a whelp, and your uncle's power was nothing compared to me." He continues to push his bolt forward, however found himself become worried as the bolt started to curve away from its target. The winds suddenly got stronger and controlled the bolt causing it to whiz by just above the vulpine's head and then curve straight back for the wizard.

Nagus couldn't move on time as his own attack came down on him. The wizard flew back a dozen feet as he was hit. The cloaked magician hit the floor, and the wind died down. The young fox also fell forward and seemed to not move. Snively noticed that the magical barrier had dispersed, and he looked around as the hedgehog, the fox, and the wizard all lay around collapsed, he seemed to come out the lucky one.

Tails then make a sound as he stirred from his apparent nap. "W-What happened?" he asked as he looked about, Nagus, and Sonic were unconscious. The only one who was awake didn't say a word; he just stood up and looked down at the wizard. The vulpine meanwhile, ran up to Sonic, his quills look singed, he remembered Nagus was causing his friend pain, but he couldn't recall what happened to the wizard. "Sonic… Sonic!" he cried as he moved a hand to the still hedgehog shaking him heavily, feeling more and more worried by the second.

* * *

The hedgehog looked around. He seemed to be no longer in the Void. Wherever he was though, held as little reality as where he was before. It was a deep black all around him, like the one time he dreamed of encountering the dark hedgehog. Was he dreaming again?

"Anyone there?" He called out amongst to darkness. There were then four lights that made their way towards him. Sonic was cautious as they approached, ready for anything to make any hostile move. When they got within a yard they circled around him for a minute before stopping. "What are you?" He asked, still on guard.

As the lights faded Sonic realized that the four lights were the elders, or at least their forms. He drops his guard, the forms obviously not hostile in intent. "What's goin' on? Where am I?" He asked them.

The purple bird looked to the hedgehog. "You're unconscious right now… we're speaking to you as best as we can to your brainwaves."

Sonic rubbed his head with a hand, "So… talk, don't have all day to be unconscious. My friend is in trouble, he needs me there, Nagus-"

A chirp came from behind the hedgehog and he turned around to see a blue bird with round eyes. "Don't worry 'bout the kid, he can handle himself… ya know that as well as we do."

"How do you know?" Sonic asked tapping his foot. "You don't know him, he might have a lot of potential, but he's still not ready to be alone, let me wake up!"

The red bird hmphs as he flaps his wing abruptly demanding the hero's attention. "We do know someone like him, his uncle Merlin Prower, have you ever heard of him?"

Sonic shook his head; his eyes softened a bit as he looked to the elder, realizing he may have overreacted. "No, we don't know of any of Tails's relatives, how do you know of him?"

It was the green one's turn to speak, "He was a resident of this isle for awhile, he said he was on an exodus, because as a wizard he had to journey in order to gain more knowledge, and thus power. He had a colleague with him by the name of Nagus. In the fox, we saw nothing but good, however his follower, we saw in him malice, the only thing that creature craved was power... when the wizard fox asked if he could stay and study we discussed it, I warned the others to not let them stay, cause I could tell that the apprentice was wicked…"

"Oh shut up Grensfeld." The purple bird interrupted, "we offered to let the wizard stay, if he promised to defend the island from poachers that used to strip us of our eggs during the breeding season, and with that we all came to an agreement.

'They stayed for a good while, the fox looking to nature to find balance while his apprentice seemed to be far hastier. When the time came for Merlin to fulfill the end of his bargain, he did so without fail. He let loose a terrible storm upon the ship that had approached this island every year for as long as we could remember, saving out people from the horrid of hiding. We were very grateful.

'About a week later, he let us know that he sensed that a young one was born, it was his nephew's birthdate, you know him as Tails. He said that he was a star in the darkness, that he had been gifted by the very powers of this world, a chosen one as it were. He was going to leave and return to see the young Miles for himself. However his apprentice had other ideas, while his mentor was studying the real and good, Nagus decided that he wanted to go to Mobotropolis and see how he could utilize the technology there to help further his magical abilities.

'You see, this is where Nagus was different from Merlin, Merlin and him argued that night about how one should obtain power through wizardry. The fox wasn't a technophobe, but he knew that, like wizardry, technology could be used for malice as well as good. That wasn't where the argument lay though; it was mainly that Nagus easily made it apparent he was just using the implementation of technology to further his powers… something about a 'sanctuary' we overheard. The fox said that power comes from other forces willingly, and shortcuts would lead to pitfalls, but of course the apprentice would not here it.

'Not but two days later, the day they were to leave, they never said goodbye to our people. The boat was gone, before we had awaken, and they must had left. We soon discovered though that Merlin never left the island, his body was discovered in the forest, he had been gravely wounded, and his cry was heard from one of our people. We had no medics that could treat such a large wound on such a large creature, there was nothing… nothing we could do to save him.

'Before his life force left him he said, 'Please take care of my nephew.' We did not know weather he spoke to us, or some other force, but not soon after our people gained powers. We could sense when the older Tails was in peril, and came to his aide. Likewise we can sense when the young Tails calls us through with his power when it is unleashed, but he still has a way to go before he matures into that…"

Sonic had to sit down, this was all so much to take in. He knew his bud had potential, but this… this was beyond him, beyond anything he could ever think of. He didn't know weather to be excited or afraid of someone so young having this power.

"Sonic Hedgehog." The red bird interrupted his thoughts, "You have more then helped us in our task of showing the young Prower his path, but we implore you to continue this, and please don't let anything happen to him, the destiny of this planet depends upon his very survival. He is the chosen one as his uncle had told us. The things he does will make sure that this planet will one day have true peace, one this planet has never truly experienced."

The hedgehog nodded, and thought he was going to cry, he couldn't believe that his friend would truly be the one to restore order. He was so proud, it was like a commencement almost, and he would continue to ensure that his buddy would succeed without question. "I will do everything to protect him."

"Then wake up… WAKE UP!"

* * *

Sonic jumps up as he feels himself shaken. "Sonic…" came the voice of his friend, a little chocked from crying so much. "Sonic!" He cries as he hugs the hero tightly.

Sonic hugs back and pat the kit. "It's ok, I'm alright bro…" He looks around over the fox's shoulder. He looked around for Nagus, and noticed the creature laying in a heap, "What happened to him?" he had to ask. He never thought he'd see the wizard so beaten. The hedgehog looked to Snively, who was standing next to the downed magician.

Snively turned to his adversary and shook his head. "Don't look at me, I was in a barrier, just as you were. It was the twerp." The human pointed to the fox.

As the hero turned back to his friend, the fox shook his head and sobbed a bit, "I don't remember what happened, the last thing I recall is you passing out and then…" He pauses to sniffle, "I woke up, and he… was there…" Tails did his best to explain what happened. Sonic looked to the kit concerned, he would have once doubted his friend would have been capable of such a stunt before, but now, he didn't know what to think. All he knew was that he had to calm him down so they could get out of the Void.

"Tails, can you lead me to the way you came in?" Sonic asked his friend as he stood up, a bit uneasy at first but he was starting to get the feeling back in his limbs. With a sniff the fox nodded, and helped Sonic to stay on his feet for the first few steps. They didn't get but a few yards when they realized that someone was following them.

"What do you think you're doing Sniffs?" The hedgehog questioned dangerously without turning, he knew very well who it was.

The human frowned a bit as he stated. "Getting out of this rotten place, what do you think rodent?"

Sonic felt himself pulled in half. He had a good heart, and he cursed as it bled for the short homo sapient, he couldn't stand leaving anything in such a miserable place. However it soon was passed as it remembered all those that were lost fighting against the tyrant, Dr. Quack, all those people on the front lines back in Knothole, all those creatures that burned in the jungle on the floating isle. All the blood on the human's hands he could not forgive and it soon cut off any sympathies he had. "No! You've put us through enough! This is the punishment fit for you, to sit in this empty shell of a place and think of all those lives you've taken, and feel the fear and pain they had as they died by your doing…" He took a deep breath as he noticed that Tails was looking at him with concern. Talking with this anger was unlike him. "Let's go Tails…" He said lightly as they sped off leaving Snively behind.

The human watched the two forms leave him alone with the unconscious wizard, a fire burned in his eyes as he shouted after the two. "YOU'LL PAY DEARLY FOR THIS, RODENT!"

0000000

Hmmm... Yep, all the questions were answered, just probably the ones you weren't asking. And if it did answer those, it probably just through many more out there. I'm mean... I'm sorry, just how I write. Next update in two weeks as normal, 21st of October, just have to look through it heavily, it seems to be sloppy and has a major plothole I have to fill up. Until then, and thanks for reading and taking the time to review.


	11. Quick Peace

"Hold on, what's going on?" Selim asked; the whole thing was somewhat confusing. "How do I know I can trust you? How do I know you're not showing me some made up story to make me believe all this happened? It seems unfathomable… who was that fox? I've never heard of an uncle who was a wizard… I don't remember any of this or why I need to know what Sonic saw…"

There was a pause, before a sigh**"I guess it is kind of hard to believe that I am trying to help you… but think of it this… I can't manipulate and tamper with someone's memories like the one who did this to you… however I have grown to understand the Void's properties so that I can show you what truly happened."  
**

"So then? You must be Nagus…?"

"**Hmm… I guess since you have seen who I am it would be ok to show you now." **The dark form steps forward, and as Selim gasps, it was the same fox he had seen in the visions of his past, the darked brown fur and the deep blue eyes. It was like staring in a strange mirror. Of course, unlike himself, the fox hadn't seemed to have aged a single day, as if even after he had matured, the brown fox had been frozen in time.

"You? Who are you?" The older fox asked.

"_I didn't have a chance to be given a name, but I was the one who was going to be you, had things not changed…"_he sighed._"You see theVoid is a garbage collector. Paths that had been avoided, removed, or effected by flaws in time get gathered here… however they are not given names… and their forms become reduced to their central components, their 'spirit' if you will. These forms are simplistic creatures called Chao."_

"Chao?" Selim sounded confused, as if he'd never heard that term before.

"_You've forgotten them as well? Don't worry about it for now. You see the important thing is that some of the 'lost' elements that are Chao are so strong in spirit that they become able to evolve in form, like myself."_

Selim was intelligent, even though he had no idea what a Chao was, he knew that he had to have 'replaced' the form before him somehow… that he wasn't supposed to have two tails and should have looked like the one before him… but something must have happened to change it. "So… how did you become… 'lost'?"

"_That's simple, before you were born… your mother was exposed to Chaos Emerald Energy, actually while she was expecting you… what happened was that since early development is easily manipulative, the energy altered the embryo not only physically but in spirit too, deprecating myself, and you replacing me."_

The older fox suddenly felt guilty, like he had stolen someone else's life… "Sorry…"

"_No need to be, it happens all the time… you will learn that Chao are numerous, as are the sudden paths life takes, but now that you see that I mean you no harm… let us continue to regain your memory."_

VVVVVVVV

The elders continued to watch the portal, it had been a good while since they had sent the young Prower in to save his friend and doubt now started to rise in their minds. Of course, when there was any doubt the green elder always voiced his concerns. "It's been a long time… maybe we should-"

"Shut it Gren," the blue elder retorted. "You said that five minutes ago."

There was a sudden flux in the portal and instantly the four birds fell silent and stared at the gate for anything to emerge. "Come on kid…" the red one said, pleading that he would be the one to emerge and not the evil wizard.

Fluctuating one more time the gate spewed a blue and orange blur into the room. The two forms stopped to reveal that it was the fox and his friend. Seeing the two safe and sound the gate quickly shut and the elders let out a relieved sigh, all the evil was still trapped in the portal, they couldn't believe it, but now it seemed that Mobius could finally have the peace it so badly needed for the past decade.

The hedgehog and fox both started to free the creatures from their glass cages. Tails looked to his friend; they hadn't said anything to one another after Sonic snapped at Snively. The vulpine knew the human deserved what he got, but he never knew that his idle could be so vicious.

"Feels great to be out of that cramped glass case!" Grensfeld, the green elder said with a sigh of relief.

"If you weren't so chubby you would have had a lot more room." The red one said with a laugh.

The green elder retorted, "Wanna make something of it twig boy?"

* * *

The human sat in the silent nothingness that surrounded him; he couldn't believe how he was fooled. Now he was stuck in this dimension, with a lunatic wizard, he knew he swore that he'd make those creatures pay, but he couldn't… he was stuck here.

There had to be a way out… he was smart… he could figure it out, but how? Nagus had far more power, but he was still trapped here, no… he was getting his hopes up. He swore, it was all he could do, he thought he had the whole world in the palm of his hand, now he had lost it all.

He looked to the wizard, and as he looked to the body he thought of what would happen when the malevolent magician awoke. Anything that came to the human's mind wasn't pleasant, he'd either toy with him just for entertainment or he'd just do away with him. Snively frowned and shivered at the thought, he wouldn't let that happen, he'd kill Nagus before the evil wizard had a chance to do anything with him.

The pointy nosed human looked around for anything to run through the downed nemesis. On the ground he saw what appeared to be light blue crystals growing, Snively nodded, those would do just nicely. He moved over to the shining growth and took in how the tips were all pointy, he saw a large one in the center and nodded, that one would do quite nicely. The human wrapped his hand around the crystal that would serve as his dagger; it was cold to the touch.

After a few good tugs it came loose causing Snively to fall backward, he looked at the shiny object that would serve as his dagger. After looking at his reflection and taking a deep breath he stood up and turned around looking upon the still body of the wizard he nodded. If he couldn't rule the world of Mobius, he'd just have to conquer the void, and if he was going to do so, he had to do so now. The human took a deep breath and raised the pointed crystal; he then brought the sharp object plummeting down.

His hand stopped in mid plunge though, he tried to continue, but his hand felt as if it were being held back by an outside force, an instant suspicion hit him and he felt himself become ice cold. The cloaked figure that was on the floor suddenly shifted and Snively realized that his suspicion was unfortunately correct.

"You fool… catch me while I'm down will you?" the wizard says hoarsely as the human find his hands began to move of their own accord. He found both of his hands around the crystal dagger, and the blade turned so that he looked like he was about to thrust into himself. "I should have you finish yourself right here and now."

Of course the little human did what he did best in situations like this, he groveled and plead with the wizard. "No…" he squeaked. "I'll do anything you want…" He thought quickly, something the magician needed. "I'll get the ingredients you need, to e-escape the void."

The wizard suddenly released the human from his grip, and he grinned as Snively gasped to catch his breath. "Hmm… I'm listening…"

* * *

Sonic, Tails, and the four elders had made it down the mountain rather quickly with the help of the birds, they knew a shortcut back to their village. When they arrived they got a heroes welcome, the other Flickies were very happy to be reunited with the elders. Of course, there was also sadness with this victory; some of the birds were still missing from the scuffle in the village from a few days back.

The hedgehog could still not believe that it was truly all over, with Snively trapped in the Void there wouldn't be anyone left to fight the war, all the machines would remain still and let them walk right in. Sally was going to flip with joy at this news, and he also was relieved that he and his best bud could finally be friends without worrying about the stuff such as destruction and death. Selim had definitely changed things, and it all seemed for the better, Sonic wished he were still here so he could give him a big hug, or something to thank him.

He smiled as he looked to Tails, "So bud, how does it feel to have helped me finally bring peace to Mobius."

The fox smiles and scratches the back of his head. "It was alright, kinda scary at times, but I'm glad we made it through ok."

There was a rustle in the bushes and the friends stopped talking as they both turned their heads to it. It was deadly silent for awhile and they both kept their eye on the brush, ready for anything to come out of the bush. They let out a sigh of relief as a red echidna made its way out of the wood work. "So what happened down here?" Knuckles asked in confusion.

"It was as you told us Knux, Robotnik was up to something, or should I say his little shrimp of a nephew. I'm pretty sure that we'll be hearin' from neither for a great while." The blue hedgehog said with a smile.

"You mean, they're dead?" Knuckles asked.

Sonic shrugged. "Well, if they aren't they probably wish they were, anyways what took you so long to get down here? We could have used a hand."

"I had to park the island you dolt, and I had to make sure the Master Emerald was safe, give me a break!" He shook his head and sighed.

The hedgehog grinned slyly and shrugged, laughing a bit as he said. "Awell, you probably wouldn't have been a good help anyway. You're always getting in my way."

He got even more of a kick as Knuckles got riled up and Tails sighed, "Come on Sonic don't start…"

* * *

Tails, Sonic and Knuckles decided to spend the night on Flickie Island since it was too late to really go anywhere. The fox and hedgehog were exhausted from the events of that day as well. It wasn't easy to escape the Void, especially with a lunatic wizard on your tail, or tails.

The hedgehog leaned up against a tree, his little bud Tails laid right beside him. The fox's head rested on the hero's ankle as the little guy slept. Knuckles of course was leaning against the other side of the tree, he had hardly said two words since Sonic teased him. The rodent shook his head and sighed, the guardian really had to lighten up.

As the hero looked around the forest he found he couldn't sleep. So much had happened these past few days, none of it seemed real to him. There was no way, after all these years of fighting, it was finally over. After having false promise many times taken away from him something didn't seem quite right. He knew, somehow, it wasn't over. He looked down to see the fox snoring softly at his feet.

Maybe it was the thing the elders told him, about Miles being some sort of 'chosen one'. He chuckled to himself, he would have never thought it, but he was not surprised. Maybe, it was because of the way that the kit was the only one who could dream of keeping up with him. Maybe it was because of his two tails and his ability to fly. Maybe it was his mechanical prowess, almost ranking up there with the Dr. Buttnik himself. Truly though, it didn't matter what it was now, peace was here and Tails wouldn't have to risk himself.

There was a wind that blew past the sleeping three, it gave Sonic a chill. Tails wasn't disturbed by the shiver; however the fox did turn, facing the other way. It was quiet for awhile after that, and the hedgehog thought he was about to join his friend in the dream world when a sudden sound startled him, it sounded like a far off stomp that caused the ground to shake lightly.

The hedgehog looked around, trying not to alarm the sleeping kit that was using his leg as a pillow. Maybe it was his imagination? The same sound rang out in the distance once again, but this time it was closer then before. He heard the red echidna stir, but he didn't know if he was awake or not.

"What is that sound?" Knuckles asked quietly, confirming the hedgehog's suspicions that he was awake. Sonic shook his head. "I don't know."

CLANK! Came the sound again and again getting closer each time, the young fox finally woke up and sat up allowing Sonic to get up and join Knuckles in scouting around for any suspicious movement. "What's going on?" Tails asked rubbing the sleep out of his eyes.

A bright light shined through the underbrush and it raised up and down, every time it came down the sound happened. The hedgehog and echidna were on guard in case whatever the strange light was attached to was hostile. The young fox flew up a bit to see if he couldn't spot what it was first.

What they all soon saw was a robot, it was relatively large in size and it was shaped like a human, two arms and two legs. It was a suit though, not a robot as Tails looked into the cockpit of the machine he could hardly believe his eyes. The long nose and short stature made him know that without a doubt the pilot was, without a doubt, Snively.

Sonic almost went white, the machine stood about three times their height, and the human looked far from happy. He had left him to rot in the void, and obviously he wasn't going to be forgiving. Tails got back on the ground and stood behind the hedgehog and Knuckles.

The machine stopped in front of the three at the same time some Flickies flew in from nearby. The human smiles, almost sadistically. "Well, well. If it isn't the terrible trio…" His eyes drift to the blue hedgehog. "You shouldn't have left me in the void; I would probably have spared you further bloodshed if you helped me. But since you wished me dead, I feel I should return the favor." He said with a smirk, looking to Tails. "Then again, I'm not going to repeat Nagus's mistake. The little twerp would probably reveal his power he did in the void if I harmed his hedgehog pal…"

Tails looked down, he wished he could remember what happened when he attacked Nagus, the thought of him striking the wizard down and him not being able to remember what he did scared him. Knuckles looked between his two comrades confusedly, "What is he talking about?"

The human laughed. "Don't even bother, apparently Nagus and I are the only people who were conscious enough to remember." He said, turning his head back to Tails. "That's why I'm making you the first priority on my hit list twerp. You should feel honored."

Shivering lightly the fox looked nervous. His hedgehog friend moved directly between the machine and the vulpine. "You have to go through me first!"

"Of course, how noble, but that can easily be arranged." He said as he moved forward, taking a large swing at the rodent with the mechanical arm. There was a clank as the swing contacted; however it was not with its target. Knuckles had blocked the arm and held the metal appendage to keep it from getting any closer to the hedgehog. The echidna growled. "You'll have to get through me too; no one tricks me and gets away with it!"

Snively growls as he tried to push the arm past the guardian, but the red echidna proved far too strong and didn't budge an inch. Knuckles looks back to Sonic and Tails, "Get out of here you two. I'll hold him off…"

Sonic laughed. "And let you have all the fun? You think I'm crazy?" He looked to see the elders shaking their head. A sudden thought was suddenly forced through his head. 'Remember your promise'. It sounded like the purple bird from his dream when he was unconscious. He looked over to see the purple elder nodding to him, and he smiled and returned the nod. "All right Knux, you take care of him, I owe ya one pal." The hedgehog said as he grabbed the fox's wrist and sped off in the direction of the Tornado.

The pointy nosed human let out another angry snarl as he saw the two get away… "Out of my way knucklehead." He said as he swung the other arm and swung it at the guardian's side. Knuckles was too busy keeping the other arm at bay and couldn't block the incoming attack. It hit hard, the echidna flew backward and hit the tree he was resting on earlier, causing a dent to form in the trunk at the point of impact. Snively didn't even bother to check if the echidna was unconscious or not, he had to get Tails before he got away.

* * *

Tails looked back to Sonic as he hopped into the plane. He felt as if he was forgetting something as he turned on the engine, the propeller moving the plane forward slowly. The fox pulled out of the brush and lined up the vehicle with a strip of land that looked flat enough to make a suitable runway.

"Lets go Tails, quickly." Said Sonic, who was now in the back seat.

Tails picked up the throttle when he finally had the plane lined up with the make shift runway. "Alright Sonic, here we go." The pilot said as the plane began to pick up speed.

After about 10 yards the kit started to pull up on the yolk and the plane started to lift off the ground. Suddenly there was a jolt and the plane seemed to stay at a hover a few feet above the surface of the island.

"What's going on?" The fox called back to Sonic.

The hedgehog looked over the side to see a mechanical suit keeping tight hold on the landing gear bar that went from the left wheel to the right. "We've got company…" Sonic said, "Sniffs has got a hold of the landing gears."

Tails growled as he felt the wings lose their lift and the plane began to descend. He needed to get air flowing over the wings and fast, or the only place they were going to go was down. He then remembered the jet engine on the bottom of the plane. "Hang on Sonic, we're gonna warp seven."

Sonic cocked his head. "Hey, that's my line…" He said wondering what Tails was doing.

There was a sudden jolt and roar as the jet engine blasted forth, causing the plane to pull forward. Snively refused to give up keeping grip on the landing gears. After a sound of warping metal there was a snap as the landing gears broke off the Tornado causing it to shoot forward and away. The only thing Snively was left with was a few bars of metal and two wheels.

"Have fun landing…" the human laughed a bit to himself before his suit suddenly left the ground in an attempt to pursuit. Something had hit him hard in the right side causing the metal suit to crash into the ground, kicking up a lot of dust. Snively shook his head as he shook the surprise from the sudden impact out of his system

The attackers voice called out, "You should have made sure I was down… nobody hits me without getting one in return." The red echidna stands a few feet away, his arms crossed in front of his chest.

The machine stood up shakily as its human pilot caught his bearings. "Right, however your friends made a fatal mistake. You see, you can't help them in the air." He laughed as the suit lifted itself off the ground with jet propulsion. "Later knucklehead." He said as he took to the skies.

Knuckles ran after the metallic suit as far as he could until the cliff edge stopped him. "Come back here you coward!" The echidna cried after the suit.

* * *

A rumble was heard throughout Flickie Island, and out of the volcano rose a gigantic air battleship, the Wing Fortress. The massive ship, newly reconstructed soared over the island, the small metal suit was a spec to it as it flew up to the gigantic resurrected airship. The suit landed on the main deck of the ship, its pilot laughed, they weren't going to get away from him this time.

A worker bot moved up to the human and asked if he had a destination in mind. Snively hopped out of the machine, making himself noticeable shorter. "After that biplane." He stated as he started toward the bridge. "Today, the twerp will be mine."

0000000

Longer chapter this time, the number of reads of the new chapters has gone, but the reviews have gone down. I think maybe it's because people are curious, but it's just been meeeh or something so it's not worth the effort to review. I guess I'll try harder to make better plot twists though I can't promise anything to tie it all together anytime soon. Next chapter in two weeks as always. 11/4/05.


	12. Taken Away

As they were flying home they were dead quiet, and besides the fact that the engine was going there was hardly a peep between Tails and Sonic. Sonic decided to break the mellowing silence. "You don't remember what Snively was talkin' about?"

The fox kept looking forward, but shook his head. He was still quiet.

"It's ok big guy, it'll probably come back to you eventually." The hero said with a wave of his hand.

Then something did come back to the kit as his eyes moved amongst the gauges. "Crap!"

Sonic jolted at the sudden outburst. "What's wrong big guy? Are you hurt?"

Tails shook his head. "Sonic, we forgot to ask Knuckles if he had any fuel… we're gonna run on empty before we get back!"

"Ah no biggy, as long as we're on dry land when it happens, we can walk the rest of the-" He then cried out in surprise as a laser passed over head… "What the…?" The hedgehog looked over his shoulder and gasped as he saw the huge air battle ship make its way closer to their flank. "Check your six Tails…"

Tails looked in the mirror on the upper part of the 'bug guard' windshield and went wide eyed as he saw the huge ship coming in from behind them. "Isn't that…?"

"The wing fortress? Yeah it looks it." Sonic stated as the big battleship closed on them. "I thought that thing was much slower though…"

The fox nodded looking down at his speedometer, with the propeller they were going as fast as possible, but the Wing Fortress was still gaining. "He must have made sure it could go faster then the Tornado this time! That's a lot of power to be pushing such a huge mass."

Sonic nodded. "We're in trouble if he catches us." The hedgehog said, stating the obvious. "Can't this thing go faster?"

The vulpine gave a nod. "Yeah, but it would eat out fuel a lot faster, we'd be lucky if we made it just with the propeller."

"It doesn't matter, as long as we are on land when we run out. I'd rather be in a crash landing then incinerated in midair." The hedgehog called back.

Tails looked to Nicole in order to find out what the shortest path to the coast was. "We've got about 3 miles. If we use the jet we might just make it… but hold on, let me be sure…" the fox typed some things into Nicole to calculate the distance to fuel ratios.

Another laser suddenly whizzed by the hedgehog's ear causing the rodent to jump. The beam smacked square into one of the buttresses that separated the right wings. "Think a bit faster please T2."

The fox ignored the plea knowing it was essential he get this calculation right. "Got it… we can go about 2 and a half miles before we would have to switch back to propeller. That should give us enough to get ready to land." He thought. "So we can either use the propeller now for a mile, or use the fuel for the two and a half… either way is fine."

Sonic gave a nod. "Whatever you think would be best big guy."

Tails sighed, great, up to him. He though a bit and another laser flew by, they seemed to be coming at them more rapidly as the battleship came closer. "I think we should lose them now with the jet, that way we're not Swiss cheese as we land." He gave a smile, this was defiantly the better decision, this was they could also slow down for the landing instead of coming to an abrupt stop. "Hold on Sonic, we're going to gain some ground."

The hedgehog agreed as the jet engine roared pushing them forward. "Let's just hope she holds together."

* * *

"_Hrmm…" The wizard thought aloud as he looked at the short human with a grin. "Ok then, here is the deal… I will force you out of the void, and you can get me the ingredients I need to make an antidote for this cursed side-effect of being trapped between time streams so long."_

_He found himself confused and panicky. He really didn't have a choice in the matter, if he said no then he would have torn him apart. "Just tell me what you need…" _

"_Bring me the Chaos Emerald, if I can bring them into the void then I'll be able to eventually discover a way to use their warping abilities to gather a way to alter the molecules in my body that have adapted to change in order to survive in the sanctuary. Also create another one of those machines; tears I create from within tend to be difficult to go through without getting blown back in… I don't have enough speed to escape."_

"_Then how am I going to get out if you cannot?"_

_With that the wizard cackled. "I'm going to give you a 'push'."_

_

* * *

_

SLAM!

That's the sound Snively's fist made as it hit the arm of the captain's chair, and got his mind off of the events of the void. He had to concentrate on getting those gems, he'd hate to feel the power of the wizard if he did more the 'push' him. He shook his head and laughed, why was he afraid of the old mage? There was no way he could do anything to him here, but still, he did need those Chaos Emeralds. If the wizard wanted them so bad, then they most have great power.

The Tornado, which was almost in his grasp, was now moving away from him at a great rate. "That twerp just won't give up… but I'm just as stubborn… More power to the engines!"

"Sir. further strain on engines will cause system failure." One of the workerbots stated.

The human thought for awhile. "Do we have any secondary ships that could catch them?"

"Affirmative." The machine responded. "One such ship does exist." The computer screen clicked on showing a Robotnik clone ship that Snively had almost forgot had. It was an earlier prototype, the doctor's mustache was probably a bit too bushy, which was why he never used it, because it was obviously fake. The human nodded, he could use it now though since he was no longer hiding behind his uncle, and they knew he was running the show.

"Launch it!" He instructed the worker bots. "But it's to do damage to the plane or the hedgehog only! I want the fox alive!"

"Yes sir!"

* * *

Tails let out a sigh of relief as the gap between them and the huge ship opened up, taking them out of attack range. He kept on his toes though, if he kept the engine going for even a few seconds too long it could spell disaster for him and Sonic. Looking forward he saw that there was a bit of land on the far horizon. 

"We're almost to the point that we'll have to slow down!" The fox called back to his friend. Sonic let out a simple nod in response, he could hear the hull of the plane start to creak under the strain of traveling so fast. She better hold together, the blue hero thought, crashing into the ocean was not an appealing way to go.

Suddenly there was a sound of tearing metal as a laser clipped the right wing causing the two to jump in surprise.

"What the heck… aren't we out of their range?" Tails asked very confused as he felt some control leave him as the right side started to act funny as some of the aerodynamics was lost. Sonic looked over the back of the plane as he saw a very shaggy looking Robotnik clone following them. "Buttnik clone ship closin' in."

Tails sighed as he looked in the mirror. "They say that a copy of a beautiful thing is an ugly thing… so what do you get when copy an ugly thing?"

"You couldn't get any uglier then the original, don't think they have a word that describes that kind of ugly, big guy." Sonic said with a smile. "Think we can shake him?"

"Going this fast, it might cause strain to the hull to make sudden movements. But I'll do my best!" Tails responded.

"Halt rodents or I'll blast you to kingdom come!" came the cloned fat man's voice.

"Scary… sounds just like him." Sonic says with a laugh. "Then again all those fakes did."

"Well, I'm not stopping!" Tails said as he kept his eyes on the gauges and horizon. "Hold on Sonic, we're going to have to shut down the engine now." He cried back to the hedgehog, flipping the jet engine switch and the roaring abruptly stopped. The momentum from the boost still lingered, it however was slowly dissipating. Sonic looked behind them, the battleship started to close in on them once again.

Another shot came from the fake Robotnik, but Tails quickly tilted the plane in order to dodge the shot. "Nice try 'Buttnik', but Sniffs programmed your aim." Sonic taunted the floating robot pod.

In response the robot let another shot fly, this one however hit dead on. The beam went straight into one side of the hull, and out the other causing both the passenger and pilot to jump. Black smoke started to poor out of the holes on both sides making Tails look at the gauges to see if there were any massive problems. "Not good…" he said, implying the worst. The fox looked up to see that they were almost over land. "I'm going to bring it down so if we have to crash we won't have to fall so far."

"Makes sense…" Sonic said with a nod as the plane began to descend. He could see the sun rising as the plane began to make its way to the shore.

The Robotnik clone was close behind, taking aim again, this time taking aim on the blue passenger. The target set, he charged up the beam. He was seconds from firing when a command suddenly came in to back off the target.

"How does it look back there?" Tails asked as he made sure to line the plane up with the ground as best as he could, it was quite a challenge because of all the hits they had taken. Sonic looked over his shoulder to see the clone pulling up away from them.

"He's pulling back?" The hedgehog told the fox, and at the same time wondering what was going on. Tails didn't think he heard his friend right; he looked over his shoulder in disbelief. His eyes then caught sight of the Wing Fortress as it closed in again. He could see a sparkle eminating from it, he peered closer taking out his binoculars and giving it a quick look over. He gasped as he saw that the energy was coming from what appeared to be a giant barrel. It was an energy cannon! A big one! That's why the machine moved away.

"Sonic hang on!" The kit cried as he pulled the yolk hard to the left, landing now off his mind. The sound of the cannon firing made the blue hero realize what was going on. A bright light enveloped everything around it blinding the two creatures in its wake as it tore across the sky at incredible speed. Tails closed his eyes hoping that they had veered far enough from the blast so that it missed.

As the fox opened his eyes the world was spinning as the plane was in a corkscrew spin, moving forward and down as smoke poured from the shattered right wing. The kit pulled on the controls, but the plane yielded no response. Everything was going so fast. The plane couldn't be controlled. There was too much gravitational force, and before the kit could cry out, or check and see if his hedgehog friend was alright everything started to black out.

* * *

Snively looked at the screen as the Tornado crashed into the beach front, kicking up sand as it smashed. The degree of the hit was pretty shallow, causing the plane to skid across the ground before stopping. They were probably still alive since it landed on its right side. 

He had to be certain though, "Have the clone bot do a comb of the area and see if we can't find the kit, or his friend."

"Yes sir…"

* * *

Everything started to come back in a blur. The first thing he could sense was a great deal of smoke in the air that was chocking him. He coughed hoarsely as he picked his head up. Sonic looked around, he was lying next to the Tornado, smoke pouring out of the hull, the dark clouds hovering over his head. As he gathered his surroundings he suddenly remembered something. "Tails…" he said to himself as he ran up to the wreckage that he was tossed from. He looked through the debris in a panic, and as he moved he could feel a pain shoot up though his right leg. He looked down to see that it looked fine; however he probably had sprained it from the impact. 

"Tails!" he called out again, coughing from the smoke.

The fox looked around as he stood up. His tail bases felt as if they were burning. He looked down and tried to twirl them, but it hurt when he did.

"Sonic!" he cried looking to his burning Tornado a few yards away. He started to move toward it when a shadow enveloped him. The vulpine turned around slowly to see the Robotnik clone pod hovering over him. The emulated doctor's voice cackled. "You're mine now Tails!"

"Sonic!" the cry of the hedgehog's friend was heard by the hero who was still sifting through the debris. Sonic quickly ran around the plane, as the call for help seemed to come from the other side. He saw the clone hovering over his friend, a claw reaching for him.

"Tails!" he cried out as he started to give chase, but was soon reminded of his injury as the pain forced him to slow down. As he saw Tails run away from the claw, he noticed that his friend also had a limp in his step, he was probably hurting too.

The pod caught up to its target and the claw clamped down around the fox's two tails causing their owner to yelp out as he soon found himself lifted off the ground. "Sonic, help!" the kit kicked and yelled but couldn't get away.

Sonic pushed himself harder, despite his injury as the clone was getting away. He growled to himself he tried to ignore the pain. "No! Let him go! I'm over here! I'm your priority!" the hedgehog cried. However, the robot ignored him, the fox was his priority, and now that the vulpine was secure he flew off with his prize.

As the capturer picked up speed Sonic felt himself forced to stop as the pain was becoming too much to ignore. He fell on his knees, his hands keeping him from falling on his face. As he heard Tails's last cries for help, faded by the distance it hit him that his friend was taken away. He sobbed, for that's all he could do.

000000000

My computer is in Safe Mode as I upload this, something attacked my system so I'm protecting my written works by my email account, so don't worry. Something called 'MyWay' got onto the system... spyware of some kind, I deleted it but it didn't help to speed it back up in normal mode. Luckily this stuff still works in safe mode. Thank you for all who still care to read these updates, and my next one will be, as you expected, on the 18th... a few chapters left before winter break.

Thank you all for the feedback on the plothole, it was a big one so I had to mend it up as best as I could. Hopefully it won't come back to haunt me too much, tell me if you see anymore. Again thanks, till next upload.


	13. Failed Promise

Knuckles peered off the edge of his island onto the world below, the long sea coming to an end; however before he could see the land a smoke stream streaked across the sky. Using the Master Emerald to direct the island toward the ominous signal, he hoped that he wasn't too late to help, but by the looks of it he was.

As the island got closer the echidna could see that his suspicions were correct. Debris of the red biplane lay scattered amongst the beach front, and Knuckles slowed down the moving land mass as it had reached the dark signal. Peering down he could see a blue form not too far from the scene of the accident. Halting the island he hopped off the edge and glided down to the ground. The closer he got to the ground the more things did not look good; the hedgehog was looking to the ground, not really moving.

"Sonic!" He called out as he ran up to the hedgehog. The blue form looked up; the side of his face had dark streaks. Was he crying? Knuckles had never seen his rival like that, and thought he never would. As the echidna got closer to Sonic he couldn't help but wonder what could have the seemingly emotionally impervious hedgehog like this?

The echidna stopped as he looked about, it hit him. "Sonic. Where is Tails?"

"He-He's gone…" the hero choked. "Snively took him… I couldn't stop him."

Knuckles nodded. "I see… so what are you doing here?"

Sonic looked up and sniffed. "What?"

"Why are you sitting here? Your friend is in danger."

The hedgehog thought for awhile. "He might already be dead."

Shaking his head the echidna sighed. "If he wanted to kill him, he wouldn't have bothered taking him away to do it…"

Realizing that Knuckles had a valid point the hedgehog felt his hope come back. "You're right!" he said standing up abruptly, but was instantly reminded of his hurt leg. A cry of pain surged up Sonic's throat, but he swallowed it.

The echidna saw the strange reaction as the hedgehog stood and nodded, noting it was probably caused by an injury. "That would explain a lot. First we should get you back to Lower Mobius and tell the others. Sally will probably put together a good plan."

Just nodding, the hedgehog agreed as Knuckles helps, letting Sonic use him as a crutch as they stumble forward a bit. The echidna saw something on the ground in front of them. "Isn't that Sally's computer?" he asked, picking up the little palm gadget.

Sonic looked to it and nodded, must be Tails dropped it when they crashed, or when he was being chased. Either way it was back in his hands again. Maybe with it Sally could find out where Tails was being taken. As they started moving back to the new Freedom Fighter base the hedgehog couldn't help put shiver at the thought of what Snively could be doing with his friend right at this very moment.

* * *

The doors to the brig opened up. The human looked into the cell where the kit was hanging from chains on the wall. Snively knew the fox could be sly, so he took no chances.

The fox looked up at the short human, a bit shaken up about being imprisoned, however he did his best to hide his fear. He still had confidence that Sonic would rescue him, as he had done many times before.

"Well little furball, how do you like your new home?"

Tails frowned, what would Sonic say in a situation like this? He smiled a bit as he thought of what to say. "Eh, it's ok, but too bad I won't be staying, once Sonic gets through with you-."

Snively smiled and interrupted the kit. "Don't bet on that twerp… because you see, heroes have their obligations and their pride. They have to have reasons to live, and to fight, where villains you see only have one motivation, and that's conquest. You see it's much easier to be the conqueror; all they have to do is find the hero's weakness and exploit it. There won't be any rescue this time. You see, I have found that cursed hedgehog's weak point, and his greatest is you. Without you he'll crumble, and as long as I have you, and there is hope of saving you, he'll run blindly to your rescue…"

The fox's fear could no longer be withheld as he shook a bit, weather it was at the cold shackles or the chilling words he didn't know. He felt a heat build up within after the chill as he realized that Sonic was in major trouble and it was all his fault. He shook in his chains trying to get out, the kit not wanting to be used as a tool in the human's schemes.

Snively smiled as the fox struggled. "As I said before, enjoy your new home, because once that rodent is out of my way you'll be the next one to go…" the human turned and walked out of the cold room, his crazy sporatic laughter echoing off the blank grey walls.

* * *

"Y'all see 'em yet?" Bunnie asked as she sat at the edge of the runway, which protruded from a pipe sticking out of the ground, with her glow sticks.

Sally shook her head as she looked through the binoculars. "No… I don't understand it Bunnie, they should have been back by now. Rotor said that Nicole's signal left the island a few hours ago. They should be here any minute… but I have a bad feeling, Sonic's never been late like this."

The rabbot yawns as her legs kick idly off the edge of the runway pipe. "I'm sure they're fine Sally-girl… they might be doin' some victory stunt or somethin'. Ya know how sugar hog and fox are."

Sally lowered the binoculars and looked sternly at her friend. "Oh thanks, make me more worried why don't you?"

Bunnie sighs, "Ya know sugar hog wouldn't let anything happen to Tails. Ya gotta stop worryin' or y'all are gonna grow grays by yer next birthday."

The princess shot the rabbot a dirty look when they heard someone approaching them from behind at a quick pace. Turning their attentions away from the skies they saw Rotor running down toward them, and Sally felt her heart start to pump faster as she could tell by the look on the walrus's face that he did not come here to give them good news.

The rabbit stood up and turned around standing next to Sally as the walrus had made it to them, catching his breath. "What's wrong Rotor?" the princess asked fearing the worst.

"Something happened…" Rotor said between breaths. "Nicole's tracing system has had a steep change in its vector. The velocity has slowed down and the direction has shifted, I don't think they're in the Tornado anymore."

Sally shivered a little as she heard this and her mind ran wild with ideas of all the possibilities on what could have happened, none of them being positive. "Are they on the continent?"

Rotor nodded, "I think we should go out to get them, before someone else does…"

"If they haven't already." The squirrel looked down as she thought of the news, Sonic could travel faster then the Tornado on foot, so why was the magnitude of movement be slower? If they were captured and in a transport that would explain it, but Rotor was right, they should go out to the signal, because the only answers to her questions would be found there.

The three of them ran down the strip and back to Lower Mobius, they had to get prepped to leave as quickly as possible.

* * *

Knuckles sighed as he helped Sonic sit on a nearby stump, they were probably about half way to the tunnels, but the echidna had to take a break. The hedgehog let off a bit of a laugh as he saw his rival take raspy breaths.

"What's wrong Knux? Been slackin' off?" the blue hero asked with a smile.

Knuckles frowned and responded with a shake of the head. "Hmm… No, you're just really heavy…" he thought a bit more. "And you should be one to talk. I can at least carry my own weight."

The hedgehog crossed his arms and sighed, Knuckles always took things way too seriously. "Well sorry, ya weren't just in a plane wreck about an hour ago!" he shouted, a bit upset at the echidna's attitude, facing away from him.

Smiling, the guardian walked up to Sonic. "I just remembered something." He said, causing the hedgehog to look over his shoulder, wondering what he was talking about.

"What are ya-" the hedgehog started before the echidna struck him across the cheek causing him to fall off of the stump backward and hit the ground with a light thud. After an abrupt silence, the hedgehog swore as he lifted himself up with a hand on the stump. He glared at Knuckles as he whipped his mouth. "What did you do that for?"

The assailant smiled with a chuckle. "Grif told me I could, remember? One good punch. I just forgot until now." He then shrugs. "Still feels just as good. Anyways I think you needed it, your head is off in the clouds."

As the hedgehog continued to rub his cheek he realized the Knuckles was right. "Ya… I guess I'm just angry at myself for lettin' Tails down. I didn't mean to take it out on you it's just…" Sonic paused, looking down.

Knuckles understood and patted his rival on the shoulder. "We will get him back; just don't hurt those that are trying to help. Save it for Snively's sorry carcass." He smiled.

Sonic looked up and nodded clenching his fists. "If he harms one hair on his head…"

Suddenly there was a deep vibration coming from the ground; brush could be heard snapping in the distance. The two looked to the jungle, noticing that the rumbling slowly made its way closer. It was obviously heading in their direction. Knuckles got into a defensive position as he then stated what was already known. "Someone's coming this way…" he growled.

The hedgehog let off a nod getting onto his feet, his leg already starting to feel a bit better. It was probably a minor sprain, just enough to hinder him a little slower at the moment. He really wasn't in the mood to fight, but he welcomed the chance to take out the frustration of losing Tails on whatever happened to come through the brush.

A grayish color could be seen rising up from the green leaves of the bushes; it was defiantly a tank of some kind. From the ground tremors and the sound of the engine, Sonic could tell that whatever it was, it was massive. "Think you can get through that armor Knux?" he asked glancing over.

"We should take out its weapons first, that way we'll only be fighting an armor shell." He shouted to the hedgehog over the loud rumbles, keeping his eyes on the vehicle as it closed in.

Sonic then noticed something and smiled relaxing a bit. "Maybe you won't have to Knuckles…" he said as the Freedom Fighter insignia caught his eye and he pointed it out to the read echidna. "It's not the enemy."

The guardian let out a sigh. "Shucks… ah well." He let out a chuckle. "I wonder how they found us."

Looking to the palm gadget in his hand, the hedgehog smiles. "Well I'll be… they probably traced us with ol' Nicole here."

The tank moved through the last line of brush and stopped before the two. A back panel of the vehicle opened up. Out of it came the forms of Sally, Bunnie, and Rotor. The three freedom fighters ran up to the two returned heroes. Sonic sighed as he saw the worried ground squirrel approach. He remembered the promise he had made to Sally before he left, he promised that nothing would happen to Tails. He had failed, miserably, how was he going to explain this to her?

As they got closer it didn't take Sally long to realize that someone was missing, she looked with immense concern to Sonic. "What happened? Where's Tails?"

Sonic closed his eyes, suddenly wishing that the tank had been foe instead of friend.

000000000

Seeings as this is the official halfway point of the story, I decided to update the summary. The next update will be on the December 2nd, winter break is fast approaching, and as such the story will not be updated for about a month during the break. Two more should come out before then.

Keep them reviews coming in, and keep reading, writing, and living.


	14. Regretful Returns

The hedgehog looked down in silence. He was never good at breaking bad news, and this was by far the worst news he ever had to deliver. Sonic remained silent for a bit as he contemplated how to tell Sally. He was hoping he'd have more to rehearse.

"Well you see…"

"Where is he Sonic?" she asked with a little more authority.

Sonic looked down and sighed again. She was going to find out eventually. "He's gone Sal…" he choked out. "I'm sorry…"

Bunny gasped. "Oh my stars…"

Sally's eyes wavered a bit as the words hit her. "W-what do you mean he's gone?" She asked, her voice sounding as wavy as the fear in her pupils, she seemed like she was about to break apart.

"Snively took him… I tried to stop him but…" the hedgehog looked defeated and ashamed.

There was sort of a collective sigh over the group as Sonic answered the princess's question. Sally looked annoyed as she glared at Sonic. "I thought you meant that he died. Don't scare me like that!"

Sonic jumps a bit. "Well geez, I kinda felt responsible so I just had a hard time saying how bad I messed up."

The princess nods in understanding. "You tried though, right? The important thing is that he's alive, and we can still get him back…" she stated putting her hand on the hedgehog's shoulder.

Bunnie tilted her head as she thought about what the hedgehog said earlier. "Wait… Snively?" she asked. "Where did he all come from? We hadn't seen nothin' of him in awhile."

Rotor gave a nod. "He disappeared ever since Doomsday. I thought he had bought it."

Sonic shook his head looking down "Buttnik's the one that bought it…"

When he said this everyone jumped a bit, except for Knuckles and the hedgehog himself. They could hardly believe their ears.

"Sonic have y'all gone and bumped your little ol' sugar-hog head? Don't ya remember the Death Egg?"

Knuckles crossed his arms in front of his chest as he watched the sun move overhead. "Listen… a lot has happened, but we got to move quickly. Every second Tails is in the enemy hands, he's in danger."

The hedgehog turned his head toward the guardian. "You mean you're gonna help?"

With a hmph, the echidna gave a nod. "Let's just say I'm going to make sure you don't screw up again."

Sonic looked down, and after a moment of being silent he looked back up. "Thanks Knux."

After another pause in the conversation the mechanic walrus decided to speak up. "Well everyone, get in, we'll get back to Lower Mobius in a Sonic second."

The hedgehog couldn't help but let out a laugh, limping a bit as he walked to the opening in the tank. "That's my line Rote… anyways, where'd you get the treds?"

Sally giggled as she followed everyone into the vehicle. "We'll explain on the way Sonic…"

* * *

The inside of the tank was spacious, but a little muggy since there weren't many vents. Sighing as he sat down the hedgehog was at thankful that the seats were nicely cushioned. With a flip of a few switches the tank was off, the cabin reverberated as it made its way back to Lower Mobius. Though there weren't many windows the inside was well lit with amber light and computer councils that lined the walls, showing what was occurring outside at all angles..

"Man, where did you pick this up?" the hedgehog asked again.

"Well we wanted it to be a surprise Sonic. Rotor and Tails worked on it all last week." Sally explained.

Sonic looked down. "I wondered what they were up to…" he mumbled. He usually would have beamed with pride, knowing his bud had helped make such a cool machine. But all he could think about was how empty it was in here without the kit's face grinning, showing off his gadget.

Facing away from the hedgehog and unable to see him sulking in thought, the others continued to have their conversations.

"Well, Sally supplied the schematics…" Rotor stated with a nod. "She was so good at drafting."

The princess looked over to the mechanic. "Let's just say I got it out of a little red book," she said solemnly.

Sonic looked up and frowned. He knew what she meant by 'red book'. It was the only trace of Selim that had remained after he had vanished, and that was his Freedom Fighter journal. The book was filled to the brim with schematics and data that the older fox had gathered over the years of his life. The mention of the log only reminded Sonic of his friend further.

"You gotta show me that book sometime." Rotor smiled with a curious gleam in his eyes.

Sally shook her head. "It was destroyed with Knothole. I did save some of the schematics on Nicole though."

Sonic shook his head. This was only half true. The book was very much intact, but Sally did most of the data into Nicole though for safe keeping. Even though Selim was gone, the princess said that the fox's identity should still be kept a secret. Something about time being fragile, and needed to stay balanced. Thinking about all this time continuum stuff just made the blue hero's head hurt.

There was a good deal of silence, besides the roar of the engine, for awhile before Bunnie recalled something. "Oh! I plum nearly forgot to ask y'all. What were ya sayin' 'bout Snively back there?"

Snapping back to reality Sonic looked up and amongst the other Freedom Fighters. "Oh, yeah! You see guys, what we thought before was right. Robuttnik did disappear after the attack on the Doomsday Project."

Sally nods as she thinks to herself. "So how do you explain the Floating Island incident? And the Death Egg?"

"That's what I'm sayin' Sal! It was all a ploy; we were all played as fools. Snively made replicas of Buttnik. We all thought the fat guy was behind it all, but we were wrong…"

"My Stars…" Bunnie said looking down.

Rotor gave a nod. "It was strange how Robotnik became so clever all of a sudden. Usually his plans weren't so monstrous and sadistic, but after Doomsday…"

As the walrus's voice drifted off the others just let out a nod in unison. They already knew what he was going to say. After that short peaceful hiatus, 'Robotnk's' attacks became much more aggressive, using massive weapons and powerful gems. The doctor's tactics seemed to change, and he seemed to fight more intelligently. With this new revelation it all made more sense.

"We have to have to have a meeting when we get back. So much has happened. And now we have to come up with a plan to rescue Tails." Sally said.

Sonic's impatience rose to the surface. "We don't have time Sal. He's in trouble! As soon as we're back in Lower Mobius I'm goin' after him."

The princess looks toward the hedgehog. "Listen Sonic, if you were Snively right now what would you be doing?"

With a scratch of the head he shrugged, his voice showing more annoyance. "I'm not Sniffs, Sal. I don't know what he's thinking."

Nodding the ground squirrel puts a hand on the hedgehog's shoulder. "Which is why you wouldn't make a good leader, you got to think like your enemy sometimes. You see, Snively knows as well as I do that Tails is your best friend. So if I were him, I would use that as an advantage. Using Tails as bait to lure you into a trap… you see? He's not going to let you just limp in and take your friend back, you should heal up first."

Sonic found the last statement somewhat insulting, crossing his arms over his chest. Normally he could deal with Sally's sarcasm, but right now he just was angry at himself and everything. "Fine…"

* * *

"They're back, Grif!" A boar called out to the goat, who was watching the security screens.

"Yep, that's them alright, open the doors and let them in Dirk." The leader of Lower Mobius said getting up from his chair and walking out into the main village.

As the sealed pipe opened up, the tank rolled into the village causing everything around to tremble lightly as it slowed to a halt. Everyone had started to gather around, news of something going wrong on the mission had spread quickly, and now many found themselves curious.

The doors of the massive vehicle lowered as Grif had made his way on the scene to welcome them back, pushing his way past the small crowd. Rotor was the first to step out, and he was surprised as he gazed upon the mass of Mobians that had gathered.

"I should make the engine run much more quietly…" the walrus mumbled as made his way to the ground. The rest of the Freedom Fighters followed right behind the mechanic. Knuckles was the last one to come out behind Sonic. The hedgehog could only look down at his feet as he shuffled out into the village.

Everyone looked to the vehicle, expecting one more form to emerge. But after a few seconds of silence Grif asked Sally the question that was plaguing the group's mind. "Where's Tails?"

The princess looked about. She wasn't about to tell the whole village that he had been kidnapped. Acting as nonchalant as possible she replied. "He's working on the Tornado, they had engine trouble on the way back. He said he's going to be awhile before it's fixed."

Grif could guess Sally wasn't being fully honest. If this were the case then why did Sonic act so down?

Dirk sifted through the crowd, breaking them apart slowly. Soon most of the onlookers went about their business, but a few stuck around. One of them was a kangaroo Mobian, who approached Sonic, noticing he was limping. "Good day, looks like you got roughed up a bit."

"Ya…" the hedgehog dully replied looking to Roy. It took awhile for the hero to remember the ex-Downunda resident's name. The marsupial kept himself busy over the past few weeks. It was mainly because since Quack had passed away they needed a new person to study medicine. Since Roy's mother was a doctor back when he was little, and she taught him some things about it, which meant the kangaroo knew more about the subject then the rest of them did. He was no Quack though, and he knew it. He had been reading for awhile, and still had a very long way to go.

As Roy looked at the hedgehog's wound he smiled. "Ain't so bad, we'll have 'er fixed up in a jiff."

Bunnie was standing nearby. "It's the emotional scars that'll be hard ta fix."

The roo didn't know what she was talking about, so he just shrugged. "Bein' a doc is hard enough. I can't be a head doc, the mind confuses me too much. Specially with loons like that 'Botnik bloke."

The area was now quiet as most of the denizens had moved away. Seeing this Sally decided it was safe enough to tell Grif, Roy and the others present about the meeting.

"So yer tellin' me we're puttin' the debotize' thing on hold?" Roy asked.

Sally smacked her forehead. She forgot that she was originally going to have Jerome derobotisized when Sonic and Tails got back. The princess gave a nod. "We'll have to do it tonight… Rotor still has bugs to work out in the machine anyway, right?" She turns to the walrus.

With a nod the mechanic thought aloud. "Ya, I should probably get to work on that…"

"After the meeting Rotor. Let's get off the streets everyone."

As the princess said those words everyone headed toward the new war room. Sonic looked down, hoping his little bro was safe.

* * *

Tails felt a cold air around him. He couldn't see anything as he was blindfolded. He felt himself tied to a pole of some sort. Suddenly the vision impairment was removed and the fox could see that the area around him was an earthy brown in color and rocky in texture. Tracks lined the floor and disappeared down the tunnel in both directions. They were obviously in an underground mine of some sort, but where he did not know.

Snively's laugh echoed down the hollow caverns causing the young fox to look about trying to see where the devious human was.

Deciding to respond to the hideously shrill laugh the fox asked the question that was plaguing his mind. "Why are we here?" His voice echoed.

The short person walked in front of the tied up young one and smiled. "Well I guess since you won't be able to tell them, it wouldn't hurt to let you know my little scheme." Snively smiles deviously and pulls out a little mechanical chip from his pocket. "Our scanners found this sewn into one of your shoes…"

What is it?"

"It's a tracer…" he chuckles in response. "I thought you had knowledge in technology like myself when I saw you reprogram the reactor at Drood Hedge, but I forgot you're just a twerp."

Tails frowned at the chuckling human. "Shut up Snively… you won't get away with this! Sonic's going to follow that signal here and wipe that smile off your face."

"Hmm… maybe you're not as stupid as I thought. You see that's exactly what I want. Look around you."

As Tails looks around he notices boxes of what seemed to be explosives lining the walls, hidden in the shadows. With a snap of Snively's fingers the kit suddenly himself gagged with a cloth. The fox felt a chill run over him as he realized what Snively was planning.

Throwing the chip into an abandoned mine cart, the human laughed. "You see, once I coax him in the right direction, he'll come blindly to his resting sight."

Tails struggled against his binds and his cries were muffled by the gag. A spybot came down and pointed toward Snivley and his prisoner. "That's it, look powerless for the camera." He smiles, giving a nod, ready to broadcast to all Mobian frequencies. Calling the hedgehog out to meet his demise.

00000000

One more update before the month winter break. I'm actually not sure when I'm going to post the next chapter. Final week make it hectic on my schedual, so it will December 16th at the latest.


	15. Into the Depths

Sally looked about the room at the solemn faces. "That news is not to leave this room." She said sternly looking to Sonic, who continued to look down in shame.

"So… Tails was kidnapped?" Grif asked as he tried to wrap his head around it. That would explain why the usually chipper hedgehog was acting so depressed.

The princess was about to nod when Nicole started to make a high pitched beeping noise that made everyone jump. Sonic looked to his pack and pulled out the little computer. He had forgotten that he had been carrying it. Placing it out on the table, Sally walked over and picked up the palm gadget.

"What is wrong Nichole?"

"Message detected Sally. It's playing on all general frequencies." The mechanical voice replied.

"That's odd…" the princess scratched her head a bit. "Play back message Nichole."

"Lag time at approximately thirty seconds, playing back message." The computer projected the image at the center of the table, and everyone instantly recognized Snively's pointy mug. Sonic looked to the human's projection with a glare, he felt like he was going to lunge at it, but his mind reminded him that it was just a hologram. The crackly voice started his message.

"_Rotten day to you, Freedom Fighters. By now, you've heard of the little prize I had collected while on Flicky Island."_

The short human moves out of the len's path. There was a collective gasp in the room as they see the two tailed kit tied to a pillar. Tails was gagged and shook his head, his eyes open wide, trying desperately to cry out. Sonic pounded his fist into the table and ground his teeth. He couldn't stand seeing his bud like that.

"_If you want to see the twerp alive again I suggest that you meet me at the Endless Mines in the mountain ranges just north of were the Great Forest used to be. I want you to bring all seven Chaos Emerald within 24 hours, or I'll have no choice but to dispose of your fox friend."_

Cackles echoed throughout the war room, as Tails started to kick a bit more, muffled yells almost drowning out the laughter. The hologram then disappeared from the center, the room darkened a bit.

"End of Message Sally." Came the computer's voice.

After the palm gadget made note of the conclusion these was a thick silence in the air. No one said a word as the message sunk in. Sally looked to Sonic, who looked like he would jump at the slightest nudge. Knuckles was frowning, arms crossed his chest thinking deeply. The others were just in plain shock, they kept looking to the little palm computer like there was more to be said. So much for keeping this a secret, every devise that picked up frequencies got that message.

With a scraping of a chair the hedgehog stood up. "I'm going after him."

"Wait Sonic… you can't just run in there alone, something wasn't right about that. I can't put my finger on it. We have to come up with a plan."

"You and your plans!" Sonic shouted. "We don't have time, there's no way we're gonna get the Chaos Emeralds in 24 hours. I say we go in and catch him off guard!"

"Sonic that's just it-"

"Blah Blah Blah! Listen Sally, I owe him and I'm going… he didn't let me down, and I won't let him down!" With that outburst the hedgehog was out of the room in a heartbeat.

Sally was left there, everything falling apart around her, she knew it was a trap, it had to be. Snively had scent that message to get the hero all riled up and it worked brilliantly. As the rest of the Freedom Fighters gathered their surroundings after all the sudden shocks, the princess could only say the first thing that rose up in her chest.

" Damn it!" She yelled, and then covered her mouth. This was the first time she had said anything rash. She had always been able to keep her calm. She always maintained composure. But at that instance she had lost it. The squirrel cleared her throat, took a deep breath, and put herself back together. In this moment, they would only succeed if her mind was focused on the problem at hand.

As Sally took her deep breaths, Bunnie looked to her friend with worry. The rabbot had rarely seen their leader act this rattled. Was she feeling the same pressure that Sonic was? Or did the blue hedgehog's sudden action put the burden there?

Now back in her composure, the princess looked amongst the group remaining in the room. She sighed. "Looks like we'll have to go after him," she placed he hand on her forehead as it burned with thought. "Alright, I'm going to take the tank out to the mines and go after him. Who's coming with me?"

Rotor, Bunnie, Knuckles, and Roy stood up. Grif and Dirk remained sitting. This didn't surprise Sally, since the goat and boar had to keep everything running smoothly in Lower Mobius. There were, perhaps, too many on this though. If it was a trap, she couldn't allow them all to be sitting ducks in the tank. "I'd really like to ask that Rotor and Roy stay here, you guys work on getting Jerome derobotisized."

Roy cocked his head. "I think Jerome wouldn't want us to deter a rescue operation for 'im. He ain't gonna go nowhere, I wanna help."

Sally sighed and looked to Roy. It had been a great while since someone other then Sonic had questioned her decisions. "Please do as I say. We need to work together right now. I've been leading too long for people to start questioning me, ok?" Her voice raised a bit as she finished her words.

There was a silence, and after a few seconds Roy gave a nod. Sally decided to call an end to the meeting before she lost any more control of the situation. The two groups parted, their moral low, but they pressed forward. Rotor hoped that Sally could stop Sonic before it was too late.

* * *

The ground squirrel entered the tank with Bunnie and Knuckles just behind her. The rabbot was worried for her friend, after Sonic ran out Sally was acting much more aggressively. When they all sat down, the disfigured rabbit decided that she should try and voice her concerns.

"Y'all think ya were a bit too harsh back 'dere Sally-girl?" the southern accent came out quietly.

Sally sighs and shakes her head as she starts up the vehicle, and starts to move it out of Lower Mobius. "Not you too Bunnie… Listen I did have a reason for my decision. I don't see why I have to explain it. You guys haven't questioned me before…"

" It's just 'cause we're all unda allota stress, and stress makes us all do crazy things. We worry 'bout ya Sally. Leadin' this team ain't easy, and we think it's startin' to get to ya." Bunnie looked to the princess softly, showing that she truly was concerned.

"That's why I always like to do think alone, too many headaches otherwise." Knuckles cut in making the two girls jump a bit. They had almost forgotten he was here with him, since he was being so quiet.

The squirrel looks down, realizing that maybe she had been affected by everything. It was all happening so fast. "I'm sorry, you're right Bunnie, it has been getting to me lately. The reason I wanted them to stay behind was because Rotor is our last technology expert, and Roy is the closest thing to a doctor we have. If anything were to happen… I don't want all our eggs in one basket…"

Patting her friend on the back the rabbot nods. "Now, let's get sugar-hog back before that varmint Snively, does."

Knuckles nods as the tank reaches the surface, heading for the mines. "You can't change what has happened, just concentrate on the here and now."

Sally gave a nod in reply, then after a pause thought about, and laughed, thinking about the irony that they were living in these events right now because of something someone did to change the past. "You should tell Tails that."

* * *

The hedgehog moved deeper into the depths of the mines. He wished that he had Nichole with him to help him search the caverns, but he had Uncle Chuck's advise from when he was younger. His unc helped him with this maze book, no matter what the young hedgehog did he couldn't get to the finish.

Chuck smiled when he told him. "Keep following the left wall. You'll get to the end eventually."

Sonic moved quicker, he lost Uncle Chuck because of Snively. He won't lose Tails too. The thought of the peril his friend was in made him move quicker, always making the left most turn and marking the way to the exit at every fork, just so he could get out quickly once he found his friend. He hoped the Endless Mines didn't live up to their name, he really hated being underground, and the thought of wandering around endlessly didn't appeal to him.

* * *

"Well… that should do it." Rotor said triumphantly. "Let's give it another shot."

Roy turned on the machine and as the chamber started to glow with an eerie light, the marsupial turned to Rotor. "She can be a grumpy Sheila, eh?"

The walrus gave a nod, he knew he was talking about Sally. He didn't take his eyes off the contraption, and really hoped it would work. "She can be. But you know, I think that's why she can lead. She always has her reasons for doing things. We're still alive, so she must be doing something right."

Walking up to the mechanic, the kangaroo asked. "How long she been leadin' for?"

Rotor thought a bit. "Hmm… I can't remember exactly when. Since she was about 11 or so… its been a long time, or it just seems that way. She's been the leader of the Freedom Fighters ever since we established, after our nanny Rosa died. That was over 5 years ago, right before Sonic brought Tails to Knothole."

Now curious, the marsupial continued the conversation. "How'd she die? Botnik get to 'er?"

The mechanic shook his head. "Surprisingly, no. She made sure to stay in Knothole. She seemed to follow it like some sort of unwritten law. Her heart gave out, and she was buried just outside the village.

Roy nods. "I guess it was for the best. These times are tough."

"The thing we still can't explain, though, is that when Tails was 10 he had this imaginary friend named Rosa, who would 'make us dinner'. Of course the meals mainly consisted of mud pies of the kit's creation. Sonic and Sally seemed sort of shocked when Tails started to do this. Sonic was sure to spend more time with Tails, because we thought he was lonely. Now what's strange is, none of us recall telling him about her."

There was a pause as the roo pondered that for a moment. "That's creepy, mate."

"There is about as much mystery surrounding Rosa as there is Selim…" the walrus was interrupted by a loud beep as the test was finished. Looking to the terminal the mechanic saw that it had gone through without error.

"Wow, it worked." Rotor said, surprised. "Now let's bring your friend in here and try it for real."

The marsupial smiled a bit. "Ya, poor bloke, let's get some skin on 'is bones."

* * *

It had been another ten minutes in the mines and the caverns seemed to be getting darker. The hedgehog wondered how deep he was, and how much further down he would have to go.

Suddenly, Sonic stopped in his tracks. He thought he heard a voice, but it was so quiet, maybe he was hearing things. As seconds of deathly silence passed by, the hero was ready to take off again when the cry came out again.

"Sonic!"

Instantly the hedgehog identified it as his friend. "Tails!" he called back. There was another pause, and Sonic could hear his voice echoing back at him. The reverberations died down, and there was more silence. The young fox's voice suddenly called out again. Sonic listened carefully, making sure that he was sure which way the sound was coming from. He was off in an instant, stopping periodically to make sure he was getting closer, and not moving further away. Keeping his cool the hedgehog continued to mark the way to the exit.

A mine cart was sitting on the tracks up ahead and Sonic stopped right next to it. When the fox cried out again the sound was as plain as day, he knew that Tails had to be nearby.

"Sonic!" There was a bit of an echo coming from the metal mine cart that was right beside the hero. He jumped onto the side of the mine cart causing it to shift a bit down the track. "Tails?" he asked looking inside.

What he found in there, however, was not his little buddy. There was a black box on the bottom of the pushcart. It made a hissing sound as it until it suddenly cried out "Sonic!" very loudly causing the hedgehog to jump a bit and the cart moved backward.

The hedgehog growled to himself, he was tricked, Tails was not here. But then why would Snively…? Sonic suddenly received a shock as sparks from the cart tires landed on a trail of black powder. A flame started to shoot down the trail of flammable substance. As his eyes darted up the trail, he spotted the answer to the question he was asking himself. All around him there were explosives, and as soon as one went off, the whole cavern would be up in smoke.

He spoke in monotone as he realized this grave error. "Bad move hedgehog… mondo bad move…"

00000000

My final final is coming up and winter break is on it's way, the next episode will be here on January 26th of next year. Hope you guys have a great holiday, and sorry to leave you in a bad spot like this.

Anyways I also tried my best to solve the Rosa problem... if you remember the episode "Blast to the Past" Sally did what Selim did and tried to change events when Robotnik took over, and the only thing she changed was saving Aunt Rosa... yet in later episodes she never once made an apperence. Tails was actually the only one to mention her at the end of the episode, so things changed but the outcome deemed similar...


	16. Under Ground Zone

It was annoying to watch all this come to pass for Selim, seeing Sonic in such danger, even after he had saved him, and all he could do was watch the outcome of the changes he had made. "Please… can't you just give me it all back… let me know if everything turned out ok…"

The other fox form sighed. _"I wish it were that simple Miles, however… however the mind is a difficult thing, don't worry about aging… it may have felt as if days have gone by, but it's only been a second… time has no meaning now. It is going to seem like awhile before your memory starts to piece itself back together… you may not remember these things so well, but it will begin to flow back, soon hopefully… you will be able to piece things together yourself."_

Selim rubbed his large fur strands that came over his face. "How did the memories planted within me seem so real? Now these ones feel like they are also real…"

"_Time is a fickle thing… many events occur over what appears to be a straight line… however, little and big things combine to form a 'history' there are infinitely many alternatives to events already past…many of us are unaware of them, because we cannot go back and change what has happened, making time seem linear. However, it is a measurement that covers all three dimensional objects at a given point, so it is not linear at all."_

After all these memories piecing together in his mind, and not knowing weather his friend made it out ok… he shook his head. "I understand… but please… let's just get this over with…"

"_Right… time is of importance…"_

Selim scratched his head… "Wait I thought-" He was about to interrupt when the lights this new past came back again…

VVVVVVV

The cabin of the tank started to shake violently as it rolled its way up to the entrance of the mines.

"What's with the tremors?" Knuckles wondered.

Sally didn't like the feeling she was getting. All this shaking could cause the cavern to become structurally compromised. If Sonic was already underground…

"Nicole! Do we have an epicenter to this quake?"

"_Earthquake is not from plate movement. It is not natural."_

That response made the ground squirrel worry even more. If these quakes were man-made, then this really was a trap. Sonic and Tails were in grave danger. Sally started to move the tank forward as she felt her heart race. Thoughts of losing them both started to run through her head. She pushed her own safety aside as she drove toward the mine entrance.

"What are you doing?" Knuckles barked, causing the princess to snap back to reality.

What was she doing? She almost did what Sonic would do. Charge in blindly, planless, not thinking of her safety or that of others. Sally looked down, a little embarrassed at her reaction.

The echidna crossed his arms in front of his chest. "He'll be fine. Sonic's been in tighter scraps then this. If we go in after him he could escape without us knowing, then we'd really be in trouble. Sonic wouldn't want us to be killed because we were trying to save him. He would never forgive himself."

Sally gave a nod as she looked blankly into the mouth of the cave. "I don't know what I was thinking."

"It's ok Sally-girl." Rabbot consoled lightly. Everyone was on edge, their hearts heavy with worry. They looked to the Endless Mines, hoping that Sonic and Tails would make it out in one piece.

* * *

Sonic ran at full speed, keeping his eyes moving. Quickly following the path he had marked, the hedgehog dodged rubble that started to fall from the ceiling. Now that the speeding rodent was more alert of his surroundings he noticed something he hadn't before. There were some dull brown obstructions sticking out of the walls at sporadic points of the shaft walls. The color matched the earthy texture, however when one took a closer look it was easy to tell they didn't belong there. Sonic could conclude that they were plastic explosives. He began to feel the heat from the erupting detonators behind him. The sounds of the explosions caused him to pick up the slack.

He really played the fool this time. Why didn't he listen to Sally? Would he get the chance to speak to her again? He really wanted to apologize, for not listening, for letting Snively get the best of him. This was personal now. The hedgehog felt his anger rise as he made his up the mine shaft. Snively would pay for taking his friend, and using him as bait. As a boulder almost hit Sonic, he snapped back to reality. He had to remain calm, a moments hesitation and he'd be consumed by the collapsing mine shaft.

There was a harsh cracking followed by a twisting of metal. Looking ahead Sonic saw that the ground under the tracks ahead had collapsed, revealing a red glow that could only be that from magma. No wonder this mine was abandoned, there must have been swells under these mountains. Sonic jumped across the new formed gap, the heat above the lava pit was intense, almost taking his breath away. The hedgehog landed on the other side, and continued to run at full speed.

A little light shimmered ahead, signifying he was almost back at the entrance. His injured leg was burning with pain, as he had really pushed it, but he couldn't stop now, or his leg would be the least of his worries. Another rumble shook the ground. Up ahead, Sonic could see boulders coming down from the roof at a steady pace. If rocks kept falling at that rate, then it would block his only escape route. He grimaced as he pushed himself further, he couldn't lose here, he had come too far. The hedgehog let out a yell as a rock smacked him in the shoulder. This was going to be close.

* * *

"_Structural integrity of subterranean passage reaching critical. Collapse imminent." _Nicole chimed.

"Sonic…" Sally felt herself start to lose it. She wanted to run in and save him, like he had done with her so many times, but she was not fast enough and she knew it. By the time she got up to the entrance it would be too late.

The squirrel had stepped outside to get some air, Bunnie had joined her. Knuckles stayed inside to give the girls some time alone, they looked as if they needed all the space they could get.

As the ground shook harder, Rabbot held her stomach, as if she were going to be sick. The rabbit looked to the cavern opening as rocks started to collapse from the entrance and block opening.

"Oh no…" Bunnie gasped.

Sally couldn't watch, but she couldn't turn away either. As the entrance started to cave in, she felt her heart sink.

Suddenly a blue blur shot out of the gathering rubble. Before either of the Freedom Fighters could react they found themselves off their feet. There was a loud explosion as the squirrel and rabbit found themselves back in the protective armor of the tank. Regaining their surroundings the two heard loud clangs of rocks against the vehicle's armor. They were a bit confused on what just happened.

Knuckles looked down to the two Freedom Fighters. "Wow! Are you two alright?" the echidna asked, helping them to their feet. "That was quite a blast. It sent boulders flying everywhere."

Another voice cut in. "Ya, the whole joint was rigged to blow."

Sally could instantly identify who it belonged to. She turned around to see the blue hedgehog. He was looking down a bit, avoiding the glances from the other three. "You guys were right… I'm sorry." Sonic said.

The princess felt her emotions go a bit wild. She was thankful he was alright, and angry that he was so careless. He apologized though, it was rare for him to do something like that, and she couldn't bring it to herself to chew him out for his actions. "Sonic… don't ever do that again." She said, trying he best to stay strong and not to fall apart which caused her to physically shake.

Sonic saw how shook up he had made her, and he walked up to her. Without a word in response the hedgehog hugged the ground squirrel tightly. "I was being stupid… ok…" He said shakily.

Caught off guard, the ground squirrel eyes teared a bit as she hugged back. Why was he acting like this? "You stupid hedgehog…" Sally said, her voice wavering, the warmth of the hedgehog's embrace made her fall apart. He never held her like this since 'Robotnik' returned to the scene. It seemed when they had an enemy to fight they were far too busy to delve into a relationship. Deep inside, she really wished this would all settle down, because in her heart she-.

"I'd hate to break this up, but where is Tails?" Knuckles interrupted with a sly grin.

Bunnie smacked the echidna on the back of the head for being rude. As the guardian rubbed the back of his bumped skull, the two Freedom Fighters broke apart their embrace and blushed a bit.

Sonic turned to Knuckles. "He wasn't there. Sniffly must have taken him with him." The hedgehog shook his head.

Sally rubbed the hero's shoulder lightly. "Don't worry Sonic, we'll get him back… but let's do it together."

"Right Sal." The hedgehog smiled. "We should get back to Lower Mobius, let's plan it out this time… Snively won't know what hit him."

"That's the spirit Sugar-hog!" Bunnie cheered.

The tank started to move again, moving over the scattered rocks that were ejected from the collapsed mine shaft. They were heading back to Lower Mobius. In the sky above, a spybot hovered in the air, watching the Mobians leave the scene.

* * *

Snively had seen all he needed to see. He frowned as he turned away from the display. "Looks like he made it out, shouldn't say I'm surprised." He turned to the bound up fox.

"The next time though… I'll be rid of the hedgehog once and for all."

The fox was getting sick of being so helpless, he glared at the human. "It's always 'next time'. If you aren't so afraid of him, why not fight him face to face and make sure the job is done."

With a scowl the human shot back at him. "I'm not afraid of him… he's afraid of me, and you should be as well, I can tear you apart limb from limb."

"Then untie me and give it a try, needle-nose…" Tails frowned.

Shaken with anger the little man looked like he was about to let the insults get to him. He then took a few deep breaths as he realized what was occurring. "Oh… you are good, little twerp… much better then I gave you credit for. You're learning from what I'm doing to your friend, and trying to do the same to me. Such potential…" he grins. "Maybe I won't dispose of you after I've gotten rid of Sonic. It'd be interesting to have an apprentice, and the world could be yours when I've passed, what do you say?"

Tails couldn't help but laugh a bit at that. "What makes you think I would help you?"

The human smiles vilely. "Who says you have a choice? If you don't cooperate I could just as easily have your brain scrambled, or better yet I could robotisize you. You'd be my first 'two-tailed' model." He laughed at his own joke.

If he weren't bound up, the kit would have attacked Snively right then and there. It had been so long since someone had poked fun at his deformity, he had almost forgotten how angry it made him.

Snively continued his scheming. "But I'm getting ahead of myself… Now it's time to initiate plan B, and I'm NOT running away this time. I know that Sonic doesn't stand a chance."

A robotic voice interrupted over the intercom. "Sir we are approaching Mount Gimmick."

"Good, prepare to land and establish a base." The short humanoid grinned.

Mount Gimmick, the name rang a bell in the young fox's head. When the Death Egg fell to pieces and reentered the atmosphere, most of the pieces of the scrambled egg landed atop of the large mountain. It was more of an extinct volcano then a mountain; it had sleeping for so long though, that it was named a mountain. The massive peak jutted out of a far corner of the Green Hills and was defiantly one of the largest mountains on Mobius. It would defiantly be difficult to assault a base on it, which was probably the reason Snively was going to establish one here.

Sonic used to tell him stories of the mountain, usually around a campfire during their 'Freedom Fighter training missions'. Many had disappeared trying to climb the peak that was Gimmick, only to disappear and never be seen again. Maybe these were just stories, however the kit recalled that his idle had rushed up many mountains, but he had always seemed to avoid Gimmick Mountain.

00000000

A little late, but I had to get all my college stuff ready, that and my new roomy is a chatterbox. Thanks for reading as always and I look forward to your critisims. Next chapter should be up on February 10th.


	17. Sonic Drive

"I thought you said time was not important…" Selim found a spot to interrupt the visions that had interrupted him.

Frowning as he was interrupted yet again, the fox shook his head._ "For you, no, you will not age. However the one who threw you back into time in order to make the events flow as they have wants to rule all of time itself… You have seen how the short one fights to rule the world, however the world is something small. Time controls all worlds, all motion, all change. By conquering it one can make an order unlike ever before."_

"Who is trying to? Nagus?" This answer brought out so many questions.

"_No, the wizard may have found a way to enter the void, however he could not use it to control the outsides… Sorry, I cannot tell you who yet without breaking your mind."_

"Isn't there a way to stop them?"

"_There is only one hope, and the first one step is to make sure that your memories are true, let us continue."_

VVVVVVVVV

Sonic sat alone in the war room. They received another message from the pointy nosed tyrant. The demands set were the same, bring the emeralds and the hedgehog was to come alone. This proved that the human still knew he was alive. No surprise there, Snively probably had a spybot to watch how perfectly his plan had worked.

Upon receiving the message, Sally called an urgent meeting. Sonic ran ahead and now he was waiting for the others to arrive. They had to be quick though, this ransom had a deadline, if he wasn't at Mount Gimmick with the emeralds in two days, Snively threatened to end Tails's life.

Why did Snively choose to establish a base on Mount Gimmick? It was bad enough that he had to rescue his best friend from the clutches of a madman, but now he had to confront Gimmick once again. Sonic remembered the stories he would tell the young fox of that place, he made up the thing about the ghosts; however the place did have a history that haunted the hedgehog. He shook his head, he couldn't think about the past now… he had to concentrate on the present, for Tails's sake.

The rest of the group then entered the room, Sally leading them in. Bunnie, Grif, Knuckles, Rotor, Roy, and an albino white mouse came into the room. Sonic looked to Jerome, who was no longer a robot. The mouse was quick to apologize for what he had done while he was under Snively's command, and was ready for payback. Seeing someone derobotisized only made Sonic think of Uncle Chuck though. If he were still alive then they could have freed him as well…

"We all know why I have called this meeting." Sally started the gathering, causing Sonic to snap out of his thoughts. "Snively has taken Tails to Mount Gimmick, and has demanded the Emeralds and Sonic for his safety."

The group nods, and Bunnie speaks up. "Ya have a plan Sally-girl?"

Everyone looked to the ground squirrel, who sat down at the end of the table and looked down, she seemed to be thinking. "I don't know right now." The princess sighed as she rubbed her forehead. "We can't just send Sonic in by himself, but we can't risk us all going in at the same time."

There was a moment of silence. Sonic then spoke up, "Why can't you send me in solo?"

Sally looked up, a bit confused. "Sonic, you remembered what happened last time you did-"

The hedgehog nods, "I know Sal. But let's make it appear that I'm goin' alone. You guys go in while I've got ol' needle nose's attention. You know like the old days…"

After a pause the princess looked up and smiled. "That just might work!" She was surprised that Sonic thought of it before she did. Maybe it was a lack of sleep.

Rotor gave a nod, "I just got done fixing the tank. We could go in that easily. I even got the engine running quieter."

Grif looked to rotor, "We also recovered something from Robotropolis awhile back that could help make your approach less detectable."

"Is this about the cloaking device you were talking about?"

The goat nods. "Ya, not sure if it will work with the tank though, we found it in a stealthbot."

"Don't see why we couldn't give it a shot." The mechanic thought to himself aloud.

Sally nods. "Alright, so let's map out our strategy then." She states, redirecting the attention in the room to her. The princess placed her small computer on the table which projected a holographic image of the Gimmick area. "He really must have planned this out. There aren't many ways to get to top of the mountain. We can assume he flew in with the Wing Fortress, so once we get to the mountain we'll have to find a way to get to the top."

She stopped for a moment noticing there was uneasiness in Sonic as she was discussing the mountain. "Are you ok Sonic?"

The hedgehog snapped up a bit and gave a nod. He felt embarrassed with everyone looking to him. "Ya Sal, was… just thinking that if I'm gonna be the distracter that I should be as far from you guys as possible right?"

With a nod the squirrel look back to the map. "The trouble is, is that the only way to the mountain is through a small stretch of land that is bordered by a massive lake. We can't take the tank over the lake, and surly Snively is going to have a massive blockade set up in that strip."

Knuckles cut in. "Well, there are high piers on the shores of the lake on the opposite side of Gimmick. We could have Sonic go over Lake Aqua, Snively probably won't be expecting that."

Sonic shook his head at the echidna. "How do you expect me to fly over that huge body of water? The Tornado is trashed. You know this."

The guardian shrugged. "You could glide over it. The wind tends to move through pier toward Gimmick. I've done it myself a few times; it's actually much faster then walking."

"I can't exactly glide Knucklehead." The hedgehog laughs.

Doing his best to suppress his agitation, the echidna replied. "Well, it wouldn't take too long to make a glider. Like a half-hour at most, right Rotor?"

With a laugh, the mechanic scratched his head. "Ya… Golly, you guys have been keeping me busy. Kind of been tough to keep up without Tails here to help me..." Sonic looked down a bit.

Sally frowns a bit. "Yes, and we thank you for all that you've done. You should stay behind when we start the operation, I'll drive the tank. Anyone else who needs rest should also stay behind, it is essential we are all alert on this mission."

The albino mouse, Jerome, cut in. "I feel like a brand new Mobian. I would really like to be on this mission if I could."

The princess gave a nod. "That's fine."

"Great that needle-nose is going to pay for making me hurt my friends." He looked to the echidna, whose shoulder was still scared from the time Jerome attacked him while he was Robotisized. "I never got to apologize for what I did."

Knuckles shrugged. "It's alright. I know you couldn't do anything about it, at least we were able to stop you."

Rotor stands up. "Well Grif, let's get the cloaking device set up and see if it works in the tank, if that's alright with you Sally."

The ground squirrel nods. "I think we have our plan. Sonic will glide over the lake and approach the Green Hill via air. This will probably cause Snively to withdraw any blockade he sets up on the small land strip, so we can drive our tank through it undetected. Any objections?"

There was no response, and so the meeting was called to a close. Rotor went with Grif to get the cloaking devise ready. Knuckles informed Sally that he was going to go back to the island and bring it to Mount Gimmick with the emeralds, if worse came to worse then he would give up the jewels of chaos to the madman. He also let her know that it would be cutting it close to the deadline, so they should go ahead as soon as they could and he would probably be able to direct the island to the mountain. "Hopefully we won't need to give up the Emeralds and you guys can get Tails out of there." Knuckles finished talking to Sally.

"I do too Knuckles… I do too." She said patting the echidna on the shoulder before he ran off. The squirrel looked around the room to see that Sonic was still there, sitting still. "Sonic?"

The hedgehog lifted his head up. "Ya Sal?"

"You're really starting to worry me, I have never seen you act this way before."

Sonic stood up. "I'm fine Sal, really."

The princess knew he was lying. She moved in behind him and wrapped her arms around the distraught hero. "Don't be so hard on yourself. It's not your fault Tails is in danger. Everything that has occurred is because of Snively, not you."

"Why does he do this?" The hedgehog asked shakily.

"I don't know Sonic. But I don't think we're supposed to ask why. You can't explain what drives someone like Snively unless you were like him. Maybe it's for power, or maybe it's just lunacy. The important thing, though, is to know what drives us, because if we lose that… then we could lose everything."

Sonic remained silent for a bit. He then placed a hand on Sally's. "Thanks Sal."

* * *

Wind blew through the hedgehog's quills as he looked to the distance. From his view on the high pier he could see Mount Gimmick standing tall against the horizon. He thought about what Sally had told him; that he had to think of what drove him. His mind went back to before he was a Freedom Fighter, when he was living in Mobotropolis. Times when he was running around the large city without a care, chowin' on chili dogs, pestering a younger Sally, and living with his Uncle Chuck.

Things have changed a lot since then. The hedgehog's home was now a confined cavern, Sally was much older, and Uncle Chuck was now gone. If Snively got his way, his uncle would not be the last one taken from him. Sonic could only imagine what it was like for those that grew up in these times, and were robbed of what he had experienced in his youth. Tails was one of those kids. He was born in these warlike times. If anything drove the hedgehog it was to make sure everyone had a chance to experience the peace he did when he was young, even if only for a minute.

Tails had a light in him, which reminded him of those days. Even in these hard times the kit could be seen smiling, and enjoying life. Sonic wouldn't let that light fade. Snively would not take it away!

The air was just right now. He picked up his glider and ran to the edge of the pier. As the hedgehog was carried over the lake, he looked down upon the water, which was reflecting the reddish hues of the afternoon sky. The fading sun reminded Sonic that time was not on his side, Tails was counting on him and he wouldn't let him down.

* * *

There was a hovering sound coming from the Sonic's right side. The hedgehog looked over his shoulder to see that he had been spotted by a spybot. Looks like it was time for the plan to take action.

Snively laughed as the image of the gliding hedgehog took up a large video monitor. The robot minions had quickly established a make-shift base amongst the ruins of the Death Egg. Tails was being forced to watch the madman's devious schemes.

"The rodent seems to be taking a strange route, but luckily my latest creation will be able to handle him, land or air." The human sneers as a door opened and a robot stepped into the room. It was dragon in shape and the metal held a jade tint.

Tails went wide eyed as he recognized the form. "D-Dulcy?"

0000000

Thank you all very much on the input for the last chapter. It's the most reviews I have recieved in between chapters so far. I hope you liked this one an will bring you an update on February 24th, until then.


	18. Sky High Above Aqua Lake

The robots that were in position on the small land strip, ready to stop the hedgehog with their blockade, began to fall back. Sally smiled to herself as she began to move the tank through the now cleared out area. The plan was working perfectly.

"This being invisible thing is pretty cool." Jerome smiled.

"Ya, must be they saw sugar-hog and took da bait. Just like we 'all planned." Bunnie replied.

Sally looked to the two and gave a nod. "It's not over yet though, we still need to get to Gimmick, and save Tails."

A beeping made all three of the Freedom Fighters jump a bit. The princess takes the palm computer, Nicole, out of her boot. When she looked into the screen she couldn't believe her eyes. "What? This can't be right…"

"What's wrong Sally-girl?"

Looking up to Bunnie, the squirrel pushed a button on the computer which showed a holographic projection of a weather map. There was a big red spot heading in their direction from the mountain. "There's a storm that's coming in from Gimmick."

Jerome scratches behind his large ear. "Whoa, hold on, didn't we check the conditions earlier? How did they change so quickly?"

Nicole replied to the question, even though it was not directed at it. _"Source of storm appears artificial in nature."_

Sally knew this was always bad news… Snively must have had something vile up his sleeve. She hoped Sonic would be alright.

* * *

The hedgehog held on tightly to the metal bar of the glider. He could see the edge of the lake coming up on the horizon. His attention was soon diverted from the ground to the skies ahead, though, as ominous clouds loomed toward him. This confused Sonic. Hadn't Nicole showed them that the air was expected to be clear for the next few days?

They didn't look like normal storm clouds either; they rolled across the sky and bolts of electricity shot out in random directions. Sonic hoped he could get across the lake before this storm struck, but as the wind began to pick up, the hedgehog realized that he was in serious trouble. As the sky darkened and the wind began to rip across the lake more violently, Sonic's flight became more unwieldy.

There was a strange sound that filled the hero's ears, it didn't sound like wind or lightning. It sounded like a crackling, like someone was crumbling up a large sheet of paper. The sound continued to grow louder and louder, and as it did Sonic felt his back became hot. Looking over his shoulder the hedgehog saw the source of this heat and sound as his glider was burning. A sharp pain started to attack the hero's hands as the heat of the flames transferred to the metal of the handle bar. He had to think fast, which fortunately, was something he was good at.

Sonic quickly descended to a few feet above the lake before he leveled out again. If he could spin dash at the right angle, he'd skip across the water like a stone. But if he came in too steep, then he would plunge into the depths.

Right as Sonic leveled off and got ready to let go, a metallic form flew in front of him. The hedgehog gasped and went wide eyed as he instantly recognized the jade figure as Dulcy. That would explain the storm, as her species of dragon were said to have the power to control the weather. Dulcy never really knew how to use this inherited ability, but since she was a robot, Snively probably found out how to unlock those powers.

"Damn you Snively." The hedgehog growled as the dragon robot let out a blast of fiery breath straight at him. Sonic let go of the bar, quickly rolling up into a ball. The hot flames nicked the rolled up hedgehog's back, incinerating his glider.

Using the momentum of his fall, Sonic started to spin forward. He held his breath, preparing for if he came in too steep. As he felt the cool water brush against his quills before ascending again, he let out his held breath in a sigh of relief. His plan was working. What he couldn't see though, was that he was heading straight for a large, rocky pier sticking out of the water.

* * *

Sally felt her heart skip a beat as she saw a blinking yellow light on her area map fade out. They had placed a tracer on Sonic's glider in order to know where the hedgehog was on his trip across the lake. When the tracker lost its signal, it was just a bit more then halfway across; this was not a good sign. It was easy for the princess's comrades to spot her worried look.

"What's wrong Sally-girl? Is Sonic alright?" Bunnie asked, her own concern growing.

"I don't know Bunnie. We've lost the tracer from the glider. The storm could be interfering with the transmission, or…" the squirrel pauses, not really wanting to think that it could mean Sonic had an accident. Deep inside though, she knew it was a great possibility.

Jerome looked to the princess. "Maybe we should stop and search the skies for him. We could aim the outward surveillance to look for him, right?"

Sally nods. "That's a good idea." She agreed, bringing the tank to a full stop so they wouldn't bump into anything. Changing the angle in the front right camera to the skies above the lake, trying to find any sign of the glider. It wasn't easy because of the dark clouds that filled the skies.

After moving the viewer back and forth for a good five minutes, Sally felt for the worst. There was no sign of the white glider, or Sonic for that matter. Suddenly the squirrel saw a flash of light in the darkness of the sky. "What is that?" she wondered aloud, zooming into the point.

"Oh my stars! Is that who I think it all is?" Bunnie gasped.

Sally couldn't believe what she was seeing. She had almost forgotten about Dulcy, and now a green, robotic dragon was flying right around the area where Sonic's signal disappeared. There was a somber silence as it slowly became clear that they weren't imagining things. Sally shook he head. Why didn't Dulcy come with them? The princess felt her head start to hurt, just when she thought her day couldn't get any worse…

"Why didn't I make her come with us?" she thought aloud, hoping that she hadn't harmed Sonic, because if he was gone, she felt nothing would matter to her anymore.

* * *

"How disappointing…" Snively sneered as he saw the blue hedgehog bounce across the lake and smack into a rocky pier.

As the rodent fell into the water below, Tails cried out his friend's name. "Sonic!" The fox knew the hedgehog couldn't swim. Every passing second, as the water settled with no sign of motion, Tails could feel his hope dwindle.

"I didn't think the rodent would fall so easily, what an easy defeat." The human chuckled deviously.

The kit couldn't believe what he was seeing… his friend… his best friend couldn't die. Sonic was indestructible. At least, he had seemed to be so in the young one's eyes. As the diabolical man continued to laugh at his victory, the vulpine felt himself become angry. If his hands weren't bound up, he would have whipped away a tear that fell down his cheek.

Snively looked to the fox and laughed. "Stop your sniffling… soon you'll be a robot and you won't even remember pain."

"You're wrong! Even though one's will is destroyed, they still feel. That's what Uncle Chuck told me! They know all they have hurt, and all the vile deeds they have done. It doesn't matter what you do to me, I'll still fight you." Tails glared at the tyrant.

The human returned the angry stare. "You've grown quite a big mouth, little twerp, shut it or I'll shut it for you."

Tails continued to speak. He was too upset over what happened to Sonic. "I don't care! Aunt Sally won't let you get away with this. She'll come and make you pay for this."

Snively grinned. "I know she will. She'll come after you, but not to worry, I'm ready for her as well." He laughed loudly as a door slide open, revealing a red glow of a lava pit. An empty harness dangled above it. The harness was connected to a grapple hook that looked like it could be opened, causing the bind and its occupant to fall into the lava below.

With a chuckle, Tails shook his head. "So let me guess? You're going to put me in that and lower me into the fiery depths? That's cliché, even for you." He joked, having recognized this kind of plan villains, from the comic books Sonic gave him, would use.

"Not exactly twerp, you have a lot to learn." Snively sneered pressing a button and a form stepped into the room. Tails gasped as he saw something he would have never expected. Himself. At least, it looked like him. The twin namesakes of this copy were tied up, and he looked far more helpless. "You see, I had a doll made after you. It's not as complicated as the Sally double that Robotnik made, but it doesn't have to be. All it needs to say is one thing."

With a press of a button a loud sound of the kit's voice echoed in the room. "Sonic! Aunt Sally! Help me!" The pleas were followed by sniffles. This display was very unsettling for the real Tails. He now could see what the human was up to. Similar to how he had tricked them all with a fake likeness of his uncle he was going to do the same thing with the doll. Lure those he considered family with their desperation to save him.

"You… bastard." Tails said, looking down. He had never said anything remotely bad all of his life, but right now he couldn't think before he spoke. His emotions of anger, and worry, and guilt of being used were too strong.

"Language, language." The human tsked. "You might upset our other guest."

Other guest? The vulpine wondered, looking up and around for any signs of another presence. A flash of silver caught the corner of his eye. As he turned toward it he let yet another gasp. There was a robotic hedgehog standing there, and at first the kit thought he was seeing things, but when Snively spoke he realized the form was real. "Are you fully charged, Metal Sonic?"

"Affirmative."

Tails shook his head. "Knuckles told us he destroyed you on the Sky Sanctuary! That you fell into the water below."

"The damage sustained was substantial. However, still salvageable. My master has made me stronger, and I am ready for a rematch with… the hedgehog." The electronic voice stated.

Snively played with the few strands on his bald head. "Hmm… I think D.U.L.C.Y. already handled him Metal Sonic, but I will allow you to help me dispose of the other miserable Freedom Fighters."

The robot looked a bit disappointed, "Very well… I calculated he was weak… I could have beaten the robot dragon with both upper appendages disabled."

"I'm pretty sure you could have... but let us not worry about that for now... let us prepare for the arrival of the other rodents..." The short human chuckled in amusement, this was all working better then he had ever dreamed.

* * *

Sonic felt himself drift, downward into the depths of the massive lake. As he drifted further down, the world around him got darker. His shoes felt like anchors as couldn't rise to the surface and he was dragged deeper and deeper. Light pierced sporadically from the thunder claps above.

As the hedgehog felt his head become numb, one thought crept through.

Was this the end?

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Sorry this one was shortish and all, school is catching up on me. I will keep being persistant though, and so my next update will be on March 10th. Trust me this month will come in like a lion. (Battle scene coming up, yay!)

Until then, thank you for reading and appreciate all the new feedback coming in, it's really helping with a nasty bit of writer's block I'm facing. I'm out.


	19. Fire and Ice

They hung their heads in silence. It was now greatly possible that Sonic was gone. With the robotic dragon circling the lake, the storm, and no sign of the glider they could do nothing but fear for the worse.

Sally started to shake a bit. She felt like a giant cement block had fallen onto her, crushing her spirit. It was ironic in a way. Even though Selim had changed things, he had failed in what he wanted to change. The princess could only imagine the older fox's disappointment if he was back in his time, knowing that his efforts didn't save his friend. Actually, now that she thought about it, there could have been another reason for Selim's disappearance. What if the older fox changed things so that _he_ didn't exist? A chill ran through Sally as she thought of that possibility.

Bunnie was on the edge of tears. The rabbot really felt for her friend. She knew that Sally was close to Sonic. It must be hitting the ground squirrel really hard. If it was anything like the pain she felt, it must have been unbearable. "My stars…" her voice cracked. It was the only thing she could say.

Jerome shook his head. He never thought he'd bare witness to this. "I can't believe it…"

The deathly silence was cut short as the engine roared to life, and the vehicle started to move once again. Both the mouse and rabbit looked to the princess, who was driving at the time, wondering what she was doing.

"Sally, y'all right?" Bunnie asked with concern.

Her friend replied with a nod, the ground squirrel's voice shaky. "Things… didn't go as planned… but Snively thinks he has won. I won't let him! Sonic… would want us to push on."

Jerome frowned, finding thid new found strength from their leader welcoming. "Right! Let's get that jerk… for Sonic, Selim, Dr. Quack, Dulcy, and Sir Charles!"

Bunnie gave a nod in agreement. "Let's give it all we got, sugar!"

The cloaked vessel continued on its way to Mount Gimmick, every passenger with vengeance on their mind.

* * *

Sonic felt himself start to black out. Everything was becoming fuzzy. He was alone; this was how he feared it would end. There wasn't a worse way to die in the hedgehog's mind. It was deathly quiet and cold. The only light was the flashing from the storm above. The hedgehog closed his eyes, letting darkness overtake him…

A voice cut through the darkness.

It sounded like Sally!

Sonic opened his eyes back up, and was blinded by a bright light.

When the light faded, the hedgehog saw Sally, but she was not alone. With her were Jerome and Bunnie. He tried to call out to them, but words didn't come out of his mouth. This must have been some kind of vision… it was the only explanation.

The three seemed to be in a metallic base of some sort, moving about stealthily.

However it appeared they were already being followed. Two deep red eyes were stalking the Freedom Fighters from behind.

Sonic tried to yell to them, warning them of the approaching threat. Again, he couldn't make a sound. It was if he wasn't even there.

Sally continued onward, the others following, not realizing the threat that was creeping up behind. The form stepped out into the light, revealing a robot that was rustic in color, had two tails, and an evil grin across its face. The sight sent a chill down the hedgehog's spine. He looked to his changed friend and called out his name, but there was, once again, no sound.

He cried out louder.

* * *

"Tails!" The hedgehog gagged as the visions faded, and his own eyes opened. He was lying on the ground, the smell of dampness in the air and the feeling of wetness in his quills indicated that he was alive.

He pushed himself up, his arms buckling a bit. It had been a long few days. Being unconscious just then was probably the only sleep he's had since being in the ruins with Tails back on Flicky Island.

As Sonic stood up and looked around, he wondered how long he had been out for. Was he too late to save Sally and the others? Were his visions of things that already happened, or things that were yet to happen? For a moment he wished that the tank didn't have a cloaking devise so he could tell if they were still out here or on Mount Gimmick.

Brushing himself off, the hero sighed and looked up to the mountain. There was only one way to tell if those images were a foreshadowing or a look at events past, and that was to climb up the mountain. As he raced toward the peak of Gimmick, Sonic hoped he wasn't too late. So caught up in getting to the mountain, he was unaware that there was a spybot that had him in its sights.

* * *

"He's still alive?" Snively snarled as the video screen came alive, a blue streak making its way across the Green Hills, toward the mountain.

Metal Sonic crossed his arms over his chest. "I calculated the dragon couldn't dispose of him correctly."

"Well she got him on the ground again… lets send her in to finish the job." The human sneered.

"Why? She will fail again… I will take care of the hedgehog!"

Snively looked to the machine with impatience. "Are you questioning my orders Metal? You seem to forget who is in charge here…my main reason for sending the dragon is because of the moral factor involved. If I sent you in there, Sonic would fight to his best ability. Since I'm putting him against an old friend, he'll be victim to his emotions, and probably wouldn't be able to fight at his best."

The metal hedgehog bows lightly. "I'm sorry master, it won't happen again. You know far more about weak organic emotions then I ever could."

The tyrant nods, "Just don't let it happen again." He warns as he contacted Dulcy, giving her the coordinates of her prey.

* * *

Despite being sore all over, Sonic pushed himself forward. The quicker he made it to the mountain, the sooner he would know if Sally and Tails were ok.

A harsh wind started to blow once again, reminding him that there was a threat in the skies, one he seriously hoped that he wouldn't have to fight. As Sonic thought of looking up to see where Dulcy was he noticed a red glow gathering on the ground beneath him and a heat started to engulf his quills. Without having to look back, he knew that he was under attack by the dragon's fiery breath.

Quickly turning to the right, the flames smashed into the ground behind the hedgehog. He looked to the skies to see the jade robot flying in pursuit. Sonic sighed, he really didn't want to fight with the dragon, but he was running out of options. It was too late to help Dulcy, but he could still have time to save Tails, and he wouldn't let anyone get in the way of that... even old friends.

The dragon was still in pursuit; keeping up with the hedgehog surprisingly well… he knew she could fly fast, but not that fast. Did Snively enhance her speed when she was robotosized? Or has the strain on him over these last few days slowed him down?

It didn't matter either way, it seemed like he wouldn't be able to simply run away from this problem.

Suddenly a blast of icy cold came down from the dragon's direction, bearing down on the fleeing hedgehog. Sonic remembered Dulcy using these talents against hordes of Swatbots, and even Robotnik himself at one point, having these powers used against him was a very unfortunate turn of events. Keeping in mind that he had to get to Mount Gimmick, he turns to the left; however the dragon was one step ahead of him and curved the ice blast to intercept the hedgehog's movement.

Sonic gasped as an embankment of ice formed ahead of him. His face turned serious as he charged forward, he wouldn't be able to avoid the slicked ground. The hedgehog's feet slipped a bit as he skid across the bank that was made by the sweeping breath.

The icy blast came to a halt as the dragon saw an opportunity to strike. As Sonic continued to slide the dragon shot forward, preparing to slice with its robotic claws. Seeing that he's in trouble, the hero tried to stop, but his sudden attempt to change momentum on the embankment causes him to lose his balance and fall backward. As the dragon swiped, the hedgehog slid right underneath her swiping claws, landing on his quills. He continued to slide until he reached the end on the ice patch. The sudden return of friction made him start to roll forward, to which the hedgehog followed through, rolling a few times before getting back on his feet. As the dragon looked over her shoulder, she noticed that her target had evaded the blow. With a barrel roll she did an about face, this time she wouldn't miss.

Noticing that Dulcy was back in pursuit, the hedgehog began to run again. He felt a warmth run down his cheek as his began to pick up speed. As he reached a hand up to touch it, he felt the area sting a bit. It seemed that she managed to nick his face with one of those claws... that was too close.

Maybe he was underestimating her. Probably because the Dulcy he knew was a carefree… well to put it bluntly, flake. She was very benevolent in nature, devious at times, but would never be the type to act with such violence toward a fellow Mobian. He couldn't stand viewing his friends as enemies, and if fighting Dulcy was such a difficulty, then going against Tails would break him.

Sonic felt his head hurt, he had to come up with a way to disable the robot without destroying it. They had lost too many over the past few weeks, and anymore lives taken would severely crush the small amount of morale the Freedom Fighters had left.

Maybe if every power of Dulcy's was amplified, maybe her weaknesses were too. Luckily the hedgehog knew of two: she was afraid of tight places, and her landings were under par. If he could find a cavern to duck into, she would either have to fly in a tight space, or land. Either way she'd be out of her element and he could use the opportunity to strike back and hopefully disable her.

A static scent filled the air causing the hedgehog to swerve. He had recognized that scent, it was an electric charge forming up to strike. When Robotnik had used the Power Ring against him with that machine, it was a smell he had become familiar with. Bolts of lightning came crashing down in the hero's path, making him swerve around it. Sonic had to concentrate in order to find a cavern to carry out his plan.

Bingo!

In one of the rolling hills there was a burrow of some sort. It was small, but large enough for the hedgehog to fit. Sonic dashed for the small hole as he continued to dodge volleys of lightning bolt shooting out at him from Dulcy's storm clouds.

The darkness of the cavern surrounded the hedgehog as he entered. He looked back to see if his plan was working, and felt his morale sink as he saw his plan backfired. Dulcy was still in the air of the cavern, pursuing him. Apparently, the cavern wasn't small enough for his plan to work. Also being a machine now, she probably couldn't experience fear. A bright flame shot forth from the dragon's mouth, taking up most of the cave behind the hedgehog and covering the ground making evasion impossible. The redness of the fiery breath gave the dark cave an eerie red light.

Sonic looked ahead and ran faster, trying to outrun the closing fire. As they continued forward, the hedgehog noticed something. They were heading straight for a dead end! With the flames behind him, and the ending cavern ahead, it looked as if there was no way to escape from being singed.

Since the hero's actions were limited, he realized that Dulcy's course of action was also constrained. This gave him an idea. Continuing to run at full speed, the hedgehog quickly made his way toward the end of the cavern, the heat from the approaching inferno tickling his quills.

Just as the flames were about to consume him, he had made it to the dead end in the cave. Using his forward momentum he ran up the wall and lept at the dragon, just over the destructive blaze of her breath. The hedgehog rolled into a spin attack and hit with the metal bulk, causing her to fly back out of the cave.

Both the organic hero and the metallic dragon hit the ground just outside the small cavern, bouncing off the grassy ground once before sliding and coming to rest a few yards from the hole.

There was a moment of silence, both Sonic and the robot Dulcy rest on the ground, neither stirring. After a bit of time, Sonic lifted his head up off the ground, he couldn't believe that attack worked. He got up slowly and moved to the downed robot. He had to find a way to disable the machine before it got up and caused him more grief.

Sonic looked over the metal dragon for a compartment or something that would contain wires, switches, things of that nature. His eyes fell upon an important looking hatch. Popping it open he hoped that he'd find something to shut the dragon off before she woke up. When he broke open the cover, wires of many thicknesses and colors filled his eyes. The hero sighed. Gadgets were not his forte.

His mind then wandered back a bit, to something Tails would say. 'It was the red one, just like Sally said.' Not having many other option, Sonic pulled at the red colored wire until it snapped. There was another pause, as the hedgehog waited to see if it worked. After a moment passed, Sonic guessed that it worked, and he stood up.

"Sorry Dulc… but my bud's in trouble, we'll be back for you when we're finished here." He said before turning his back on the dragon, ready to make his way back to the mountain.

He didn't see the robotic eyes shoot open, or the metallic tail swing at him. Sonic only realized that Dulcy was still active when the strong appendage wrapped around him. The cold metal sent a chill through him.

With a snarl, the dragon's red eyes glared at its prey before it lifted its tail, with the hedgehog in tow. Sonic felt himself leave the ground, and realized he was in trouble as the robot slammed its tail to the ground, bringing the hedgehog with it. He was whipped into the ground again and again, until he began to become disoriented.

The dragon let go of Sonic, and towered before the hero's battered body. As the hedgehog looked up shakily, his irises reflected a redish glow as a flame gathered at the robot's muzzle. He closed his eyes, as he waited to be consumed by the fire he wouldn't be able to dodge.

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Another one down 5 more to go. I'm in a bad case of writers block. Even so two weeks 03/24/05 will mark the next chapter, see you then.


	20. Preperations

A rumbling sound echoed throughout the hills, it sounded like real loud thunder. Sonic could feel the heat from the dragon's robotic muzzle. Then there was a sudden explosion that roared through the air. For a second time this day, Sonic felt that his end was near.

With a sound of a massive metal to metal impact, the dragon flew though the air, crashing onto its side about twenty feet away. All these noises made Sonic curious, and caused him to open his eyes. He was surprised to see the aggressive dragon down for the count.

It didn't take long to see what had hit her. There was a large gaping hole in the dragon robot, and a large shell rolled along the ground not too far away. Sonic recognized the stopped projectile as the same size their new tank used. The hedgehog looked up, trying to see if he couldn't find the tank out there, he knew it had to be uncloaked to fire.

After looking about for awhile, Sonic gave up. By this time they had probably already reestablished their cloaking field and were heading back toward Gimmick Mountain. Though he didn't see them, it was a big weight off of his chest to know that Sally was still out there and he was not in this fight alone. However, after that vicious attack, he could barely move.

He reached for his pack, which had fallen nearby. His hand came across a metal, smooth surface. Sonic recognized its torus shape as a power ring, he had almost forgotten he had brought one with him. It was a good thing his did, or he probably wouldn't have been able to get up. As the hedgehog wrapped his hand around the glowing ring, he felt his energy return to him. He gave one last look to Dulcy before booking it back toward the mountain.

* * *

"My stars Sally-girl... Did y'all have to hit 'er that hard?" Bunnie asked as she saw what the shell impact did to the dragon.

Sally looked down. "I'm sorry… it's just that… I wasn't going to sit by and watch Sonic get hurt." She looked back to Bunnie and sighed. "If we repair her before derobotization she might be ok… it'll just take some time. If only we had hit their dragon robotisizer during our raid!" The squirrel fumed at her mistake.

Her friend put her organic hand on the princess's shoulder. "Ya did all you could Sally-girl…" she said solemly. Looking back to the external camera screen, seeing Sonic laying on the ground. "Ya think we should go check on ol' sugarhog?"

Looking to the screens herself seeing the hedgehog sit up, looking around and reaching for a glowing ring. "No. He has a power ring… he'll be fine. We're back in stealth mode right?"

"Yep." A mouse stated as he came down from the gunner's chair. "Put it back on after firing, as instructed."

"That was some great shootin' Tex…" Bunnie commented.

The albino rodent scratched behind his ear. "It was luck mainly… there's a big difference in hand guns and artillery. A much bigger kick, and much greater of a projectile arc…"

"Y'all must have had a good teacher." The rabbot said as Sally moved the controls to move the tank forward once again.

Jerome gave a nod. "He was once considered one of the best shots in Downunda… and when he taught me the ropes I was honored… but the man changed, letting his greed consume him. After he decided to be a thief, I never saw him again, nor do I care too…"

Bunnie gave a nod. "It's a harsh world these days, ain't it?"

"Ya, Nack was a great Mobian before greed took over… changed his name to Fang or something…" Jerome stated.

The rabbot could help but do a double take on the name. "Fang? Did y'all just say his name was Fang?"

"Ya, you sound like you know him." Jerome looked at Bunnie curiously.

"I guess y'all could say that, when we 'all were tryin' to take out the Atomic Destroier we crossed path.… did ya know he died?"

The mouse shook his head and looked down. "Doesn't surprise me… greed consumed and blinded him, he probably never saw his end coming."

"Ya… but who knows… he was a tricky one, maybe he'll turn up like the rest o' these so call'd bucket kickers" Bunnie laughed looking to her squirrel friend who was busy operating the tank. It seemed like only a few days ago when she and Tails were aboard the Destroyer… and with that her thoughts were back on the young fox, who was still somewhere on, or in, the mountain that towered higher into the sky as they rolled closer to it. They could start to see faint glowing, like fireflies, flash up and down the mountain.

"Looks like Snively is building a base in the mountain… probably preparing for Sonic." Sally looked amongst the gages, everything looked fine.

"All that just for Sonic?" Jerome laughed. "Snives must know that he is out for his head."

As if on some sort of que, a blue blur suddenly passed the tank, heading straight for what appeared to be an entrance that had been dug out into the mountain.

"Speakin' of the little ol' sugar hog." Bunnie smiled, glad to see that the hedgehog was up and running again.

Jerome also grinned. "He's heading straight into the lion's den… just as planned. So where are we going in?"

The tank accelerated toward the mountain, trying to stay behind Sonic, but easily losing ground. Sally looked back for a second. "We're taking the back door… Snively knows Sonic would charge from the front, so the other side of the mountain is probably less protected." The princess explained.

The albino nods. "Makes sense…"

"I just hope Sonic'll be alright." Bunnie worried aloud.

* * *

Watching the screen, Tails felt his heart soar. The madness of watching the friend against friend combat was at an end. It was a bittersweet feeling though as he saw the hole torn into the dragon's hull, the hopes of Dulcy returning to the way she once was demished greatly. The kit really liked Dulcy, he liked to hear stories of the high skies. He always wished he had that freedom, flying high without using his contraptions. Not that he didn't enjoy flying his plane; it just wasn't quite the same as just being able to do it without it. It was just different.

Snively and the robotic hedgehog had moved away. They seemed to be reviewing the events that had just happened. Tails wished he could hear them; he didn't like not knowing what was going on. Even if there was nothing he could do about it.

* * *

"…that shell could not have come out of nowhere! Are you sure that our cannons didn't misfire?" the human asked Metal Sonic, who was done going through the computer data for the third time.

"I've scanned the data array multiple times, and it shows no unauthorized activity. There is also no evidence of tampering of array contents. The machine does not lie; organics are the ones that have created mistrust. Do you not believe your own devises?" Mecha asked coldly.

"I believe it… but it's hard to… there always has to be an explaination." Snively replied. "If one of our cannons didn't fire that round, then what else could have?"

"The answer is simple. It was someone else's cannon."

"Then you think they're out there?" Snively asked.

"Of course they are… Organics have the habit of swarming to the aid of another. It's their function, their nature…"

The human frowned. "I told the rodent to come alone… he broke the rules… now I'll have to break my end of the bargain."

"Had you any intention of keeping you word?" The robot lets out a laugh.

Snively smiled wickedly. "Guess you have a point… the poor boy."

Sneering, the metal hedgehog turned away from the logs. " 'Poor boy?' The fox's organic side is the thing that makes him feeble, you offer him perfection. I don't comprehend why you offer it to one like him though…"

The human shook his head. "You were deactivated. I've seen what the kid is truly capable of, what he will be capable of. I'm just giving him a boost to reach that potential now. Then even the hedgehog won't stand a chance…"

"I assure you, I am capable of disposing of… that life form… myself. Machines don't lie." Mecha looked to the human with a threatening glance.

He wanted to tell the machine that he had a personality AI, that he still had the ability to feel organic emotions. Such as the jealousy and pride that blinded the metal hedgehog at this very moment. The human knew though, that if he pushed the wrong button the emotion of anger would shoot forth, and it could have disastrous effects. Snively wanted Sonic to be the one to be destroyed at the robot's hands, not himself. "If… When you do, then the kit will be useless to me and I'll dispose of him." The short tyrant walked away and back toward the fox.

* * *

"It's time." The human said looking to the Swatbot grunts standing guard around the fox kit. "Take him into the flying fortress, and get the fake set up."

Two swatbot grunts released the kit from his bindings causing Tails to spring back to life, "Sonic's not dumb enough to fall for your stupid tricks. He'll know that doll is not me, and then he'll finish you!" The fox kicked and squirmed against the grunts, but he was held too tight to make any leeway.

"If you're so confident that he won't be tricked… then why make such a fuss?" Snively asked with a smirk.

The fox's kicking halted as the question seemed to hit home. He remembered when he was captured before he didn't really struggle. What had caused this change? Was it because he really was beginning to doubt Sonic? Maybe it was because he remembered how Robotnik had fooled the hedgehog with a clone of Sally some years back. If he fell for that trick then, what would keep him from falling for it again this time?

When he couldn't find the answer, and Snively noticed no response, the human cracked a sneer. "Just as I thought."

Tails hung his head as the hatch closed, swallowing the fox and robots from view. The fake doll was placed in its perilous position. Now all that they had to do was wait for their guest of honor to arrive. The human didn't have to wait too long as an alarm sounded, indicating that the hedgehog was here. Snively turned to the anxious robot and gave a nod. "Get ready, you'll soon get the rematch you've been longing for…"

Metal Sonic sneered. "I can't wait…"

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Sorry, slow chapter this time, I think from here on out though it'll get better. Anyway, thanks for getting this far, and any feedback would be great. Next chapter on April 7th, until then wait to see what fate awaits our heroes.


	21. Mount Gimmick

"Finally…" a red echidna sighed as he entered the emerald chamber. He was very relieved to find them all there. Hiding the island was impossible, so he took a great risk in leaving it hovering unprotected. Sonic was going to owe him for all he's done, and now he was going to direct his island toward the mountain of Gimmick. He was to bring the emeralds in order to complete the bargain in case things didn't go as planned.

Knowing Sonic as he did, things were probably not going according to plan. Knuckles hoped that if it did come to giving up the emeralds, that he could find a way to take them back without incident. If the hedgehog did anything stupid he would give him a good wallop.

He put a gloved hand upon the Master Emerald and it glowed with a green light. A light rumbling and the island began to move. The echidna had to make sure he channeled enough energy into the island so that it could stay afloat without the emeralds for awhile. He couldn't imagine the damage that would be done if the island landed onto the lands below. It was a hard enough impact on the water's surface.

The echidna hoped that he wasn't directing the island to his downfall.

* * *

Looking along the tunnels of Mount Gimmick, Sonic realized that not much had changed since he had first explored here almost a decade ago. The walls were a deep grayish tone, and contained rough gouges, as if a large beast had attacked the cavern with sharp claws.

He continued to feel himself torn by what had happened back there… he wanted to go back and help Dulcy, though he hadn't known her as long as he had the rest of the Freedom Fighters, she still was an essential team member. But Tails's peril pulled him more then the dragon did… but he could feel his heart split. He felt terrible for leaving her in that way. But his mind was made up, he had to help Tails, and when the fox was out of harms way… then would go back to help her. The hedgehog at least knew that she wasn't going anywhere soon. She was heavy enough in organic form.

Sonic was surprised as he kept moving forward, there seemed to be no changes at all. It was kind of disappointing; the hedgehog expected Snively to be prepared for his arrival.

As soon as he had thought this though, the grey rock had come to an end, and his feet began to make loud noises against the metallic floor. The hedgehog had to stop for a minute, as before him stood a massive structure that could have only been man made. Conveyor belts, high and low, were transporting some sort of rock. It looked as if Snively was building a base inside of the mountain. Which was strange, since the human seemed so confident he would have changed the past back on Flicky Island. Sonic couldn't help but laugh a bit, maybe Snootly had grown so accustom to losing that he had been building this the whole time, and was ready to run to it as soon as the plan had failed.

He wondered where Tails could be. If only Snively hadn't found that tracer he could find him in a Sonic-second. The only way he could hope on finding his pal now was to just search. Even with his speed, this could take awhile.

The hedgehog moved forward, his sneakers clanging against the metallic flooring, echoing across the factory like room. Other then the sound of his steps and the whirling of the conveyor gears, there was silence. It was far too quiet for Sonic's liking. He started to pick up his pace, looking for a way to get to the higher levels of this makeshift base. Sonic knew that Snively probably flew the Wing Fortress here, so he would probably be on a higher floor.

Sounds of footsteps started to echo, but these were much louder then the hedgehog's. He was not alone. Then again, Sonic would have been disappointed if he was.

Darkness began to fill the area as the large lights dimmed down, causing the hero to look up. His eyes moved among the higher platforms that surrounded his current position. There had to be more then three dozen red sensors glowing down upon him. Sonic could instantly recognize them as Swatbots, and it appeared they had prepared an ambush.

A sole light shone down about 50 yards in front of the hedgehog, revealing an elevator, exactly what Sonic was looking for. He could see a short green man standing upon it. The hedgehog glared at what he could make out to be none other then the tyrant who had kidnapped his friend.

"Well, Well…. Like leading a rodent to cheese." Snively sneered.

* * *

Sally, Bunnie, and Jerome were pushed back into their seats as the tank was climbing up the rear of the mountain. The vehicle was handling the climb with relative ease, but the amount of torque required was really eating away at their fuel.

"We'll have to deactivate the cloaking devise, or we won't make it up the mountain." The princess pointed out.

"Guess we couldn't stay hidden forever." Jerome stated.

Bunnie watched on as Sally began to deactivate the devise. "Sugarhog is probably causin' a fuss. I think we'll all be alright."

"Let's hope you're right Bunnie…" Sally responded as the vehicle became visible once again.

* * *

Cold red eyes looked amongst the spybot surveillance screens. Metal Sonic had received specific instructions from Snively to keep an eye out for any other organics that decided to come out of the wood works. The robot couldn't understand why he couldn't just head down and take care of the hedgehog himself, but he had patience, and eventually it would be just Sonic against him, just as it was in the Sky Sanctuary. This time though, Metal knew he would come out on top. 

A red light flashed on the console causing the robot to investigate. The screen showed a large vehicle climbing up the rear side of the mountain. The large cannon that was mounted on it explained how the dragon was shot down. Metal knew that there had to be some explanation.

The robot stood up. With the speed the large machine was traveling, it'd be easy to handle these intruders all by itself.

* * *

"Cut it Sniffs! Where's Tails?" the hedgehog leered at the human who stood in the center of a bright red arc generated by the visors of the many Swatbots.

"Where are my emeralds?" Snively retorted.

"Knuckles is on his way here with them." Sonic told the vertically challenged kidnapper.

The human shook his head in response. "Then you've broken the deal rodent… 'come alone with the emeralds and I would give you your friend' I believe was our agreement. Since you went back on your end, looks like I'll have to go back on mine." The villain smirked. "But I suppose the deadline is still a few hours a way. You could always be a good little hedgehog and fetch the emeralds and be back in time to save your friend."

Sonic clenched his fist, was he just going to let his friend be used as an item of trade? Chances were Snively had already harmed his pal, and if he ran off it'd give the human even more chances to harm the fox.

"Go fetch, 'Fido'…" the human cackled at his lame joke. Lame as it was, it was enough to cause a surge of anger to rise through the hero. Sonic didn't care that he was outnumbered! He was here to save his friend, not bargain with the man that had taken so much from him.

Looking up with fires in his eyes, the hedgehog yelled. "I can tell you where to stick those emeralds!" The voice echoed in the room, causing a great, long silence.

As the silence persisted, the hedgehog began to become worried. His friend was in danger, and now he could have just pulled the final string that would cause the short human to show no mercy to his captive. The way the human's face scrunched at the hedgehog nasty reply was not a good sign.

The silence was disrupted by a whirling of the elevator platform the kidnapper stood upon, going up. "I guess that means our deal is off. I was going to let you at least say goodbye to the twerp, but because of that comment…" He didn't need to say anything more as the Swatbots raised their laser weapons. "Farewell rodent…" were Snively's final words as he disappeared to the floors above.

Sonic looked behind him where he had come in to see that the room had been closed off. The red beams of light started to glow more brightly as the room started to fill with the sound of robots moving about and charging their weapons.

* * *

"I think I saw a metal hatch up a head." Jerome said looking out through the external video feed.

Sally turned from the controls to look where the mouse was. Seeing the shine of the metallic surface brought a smile to her face. The vehicle continued to climb the mountain with relative ease as the princess made light adjustments in her course. "Alright let's get ready to penetrate the rear of the base, you guys ready?" the ground squirrel looked to her comrades.

They were about to respond when there was a sudden grinding noise that caused the three Mobians to cover their ears. The cabin of the vehicle rattled as the internal lighting flicked. And as soon as the strange chaos had begun, it had ceased.

"What da hoo-ha happened?" Bunnie groaned as her eyes adjusted to the dim lighting. Whatever had occurred obviously affected the electrical systems, since the external video display blacked out and the vehicle came to a complete halt.

"I don't know Bunnie," Sally sounded worried. "We probably hit something. I guess we could hike the rest of it."

"Sounds like a plan, I was getting kinda anxious to move anyway." Jerome tried to remain optimistic, moving toward the emergency hatch. With a shove of the latch the night air came in to replace the artificial cooled air with a natural mugginess. The air seemed to have gotten humid rather quickly. It looked like it was going to storm again. Knowing that the robotisized Dulcy was out of commission made Sally pretty sure that this gathering of ominous clouds was created by nature.

Bunnie also noticed the gathering storm. "Might wanna all get our keesters in the base Sally-girl, I don't wanna rust up."

As the princess turned away from the horizon and to her friend her eyes grazed upon the machinery they had just come out of. A long gash could be seen in the side causing Sally to forget what she was going to say. Her friends notice the leaders silence and turn to see what had gathered the princess's attention.

When Bunnie turned to see the damage done she gasped. "My stars, it's like somethin' ripped right through it."

Jerome shook his head. "That's a lot of armor to just rip through…"

Sally didn't like this, not one bit. The tear in the hull seemed all too familiar to her; it was as if Sonic had sliced through it. "Everyone, be careful… I don't think we're alone out here."

The albino mouse understood, taking out an EMP grenade that he had brought with him. It was a good chance they were dealing with a robot. How it was able to strike and disappear so quickly caused them all to be on edge. Bunnie looked around, ready to strike at anything foolish enough to charge at them.

Sporadic lights flashed on the distant clouds and each flicker was followed up by a low rumble. Seeing that there was no threat in the immediate area the three began to move up the steep hill toward the metal hatch. The climb was a bit more difficult without the tank, as it was a pretty sharp incline to traverse. This also troubled the princess, because terrain like this would be almost impossible to navigate for a machine like a Swatbot. That could only mean that what was out there was far more dangerous…

Jerome suddenly stopped in his tracks. "Hey look, it's Sonic!"

With those words the princess and her rabbit friend stopped. They looked in the direction that the albino mouse's eyes were pointing. In the dark shadows stood a figure that had quills and looked exactly like the blue hedgehog, but because of the cloud cover it was hard to make out any distinguishing features.

Sally was about to call out to him when a harsh breeze blew over the area causing her fur to ruffle. But as the wind washed over the figure, the quills didn't move in the slightest. Something wasn't right… "That's not Sonic…" the princess voiced her suspicions.

Though her comrades were reluctant to believe their leader, her statement was proven true as the figure's eyes came into view. A crimson, fiery red glared at them through the darkness of the approaching storm. Metallic laughter filled the air as the three stared at the malevolent form.

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That's it for now, next chapter will be up on April 21st.


	22. Amongst the Scrammbled Egg

Knuckles, the echidna continued to will the floating island toward the giant mountain known as Gimmick. He noticed a resistance to the motion of the levitating land, one that usually signaled that he was heading toward a storm. Though it may have been coincidence, rough weather always seemed to spell trouble.

At this rate he would arrive at the destination within the hour. He wondered how the Freedom Fighters were holding out.

* * *

The rain started to poor down as the deep red eyes of the shaded hedgehog leered at the three Freedom Fighters. It was a harsh, heavy downpour that quickly caused the three creatures to have their fur drip and mat against their body, weighing them down a bit.

Jerome frowned. "He couldn't have robotosized Sonic that fast, could he?"

Sally shook her head. The wing fortress didn't have robotosizing equipment when they last looked upon the schematics. She remembered Sonic telling her of this machine Robotnik made that was supposed to match him. Well, maybe it was Snively's creation too, but that didn't matter, what mattered is that if it was that machine, they were all in danger. "No, that's not Sonic… it's a metal replicate, now be careful everyone…"

As soon as the princess said these words the form charged forward, catching them off guard. Its target was the squirrel who had just dared to call him a copy of Sonic. The blow came fast knocking Sally back a few feet down the side of the mountain, a jutting rock halting her from descending too far.

"Sally!" Bunnie cried as her friend didn't make any sign of moving. Part of her wanted to check on her friend, but she knew better, right now the rabbot let he anger bubble up, she had to take out this scrap of metal before anyone else was hurt.

The albino mouse was already on top of it though, and he removed the safety pin from his EMP explosive and hurled it at the intruder as it looked toward the princess. A machine-like voice came out coldly, directed to the fallen ground squirrel. "You should reevaluate analyzing me as an equal to that organic, weak hedgehog."

Metal Sonic picked up a reading on his surrounding current vibration detector. It 'sounded' like an object of some sort was coming toward his current position. He brought a metal foot around and kicked the grenade before it had a chance to land, sending it back toward the sender.

Jerome was a bit shocked to see the projectile come flying back toward him. He knew picking it up would be dangerous, it could explode at any second sending the casing outward. Since it was an EMP explosive, the impact wouldn't affect him since he wasn't a…

When the thought suddenly entering his mind, he cried out, "Watch out Bunnie!"

It was too late though, before the rabbit could react the blue flash enveloped the two Mobians. Jerome was blinded for a bit, and the metal hedgehog took the opportunity to attack. The mouse was struck in the back as he stumbled about. A shrill squeak rang out as the albino Mobian hit the ground.

Bunnie looked to her side as her vision started to return. "Jerome?" She asked as she tried to move, but her legs refused to budge. Her metal arm also refused to stir, feeling as if it were a huge weight, pulling at her side. It was painful, like when she first had to get used to using the heavy limbs. As she looked down she was the mouse laying on the ground, unmoving.

Before she had a chance to let out a gasp, Metal Sonic approached her slowly, blocking her view of her fallen comrades. "I can sense strain amongst your organic side. We will help you lose that weakness forever, the sensation of pain gone forever, you should be grateful."

With those words the rabbit took her organic hand and punched with all her might at the artificial hedgehog. A loud clang sounded as the punch smashed into the robot's cheek area, making it take a step back.

The sound of the collision covered up the sound of the rabbit's knuckles crackling at impact. A tear fell down her cheek as a huge shot of pain tingled through her hand. Whether it was because of the sensation itself, or because she knew this could be the last chance to feel injured, she did not know.

"Such frailty…" the robot said simply.

Rabbot leered at Metal Sonic's words. If her hand didn't feel as if it were broken, and her metallic limbs weren't paralyzed, she would have torn him limb from limb. However, all she could do was wait for the blow that would cause her to join her companions into the state of unconsciousness.

* * *

"_Come on! You're not scared, are ya?" A blue hedgehog jeered at his friend, who was standing behind a rock. The rodent appeared young, around the age of five or four. His friend was about the same age, though it was obvious he was the older of the two, as the young buck couldn't believe he was letting this littler Mobian taunt him so. _

"_I'm not scared… those ghost stories are just… made up, yeah—they're made up…" The deer didn't sound too confident, but it was enough to let himself step forward a bit. _

"_Then how 'bout a race?" The young Sonic asked._

"_You'd just beat me again… you with your super shoes of yours." Sonic's friend laughed, he had never believed that it was the hedgehog that was the one who could run that fast. Wrapping his head around the concept that a younger sibling could possess speed that out shown most adults he knew was just plain impossible. The only explanation is that those red shoes of his… the ones that were made by his Uncle gifted him with his speed._

_The hedgehog kept his cockiness high though, and he started to take off his shoes… "Alright… if ya think it's da shoes, try 'em on. I'll go bare foot." _

_Looking at those shoes of speed the deer couldn't say 'no'. How could he? If he refused this the hedgehog would never let him live it down. _

"_So what are ya waitin' for? Put em on." The barefoot hedgehog grew impatient._

_The deer leaned down and picked up the shoes, and as he put them on his feet he realized something. "They don't fit on me that well…" _

"_We gonna race or not? Unless ya wanna stay in this ol' 'haunted' cave." Laughed the blue rodent, making reference to the old folk tales of the caverns being haunted by some ancient Mobian spirit, which the deer seemed to have complete belief in._

_Pulling at the shoes a bit the buck felt he had them on the best he could. Now he was ready to prove that all his friend's abilities were all because of the footwear. "Alright, I'm ready… same rules as always?" _

"_Yep, ya can get a little head start… see ya at the entrance." Confirmed the young rodent, closing his eyes, he started to count. _

_With that signal, the buck ran into the darkness, moving at normal speed. "I guess it'll take awhile for them to kick in… but when they do, I'll be the one to beat ya." The deer's voice called from the darkness, his friend however just continued to count. _

_Twenty seconds later, and the hedgehog opened his eyes, it was time to start. The child sped forward like a bullet out of a gun, running though the dark cave as if he'd been living in them all of his life. A light came at the end of the long tunnel and the speedy rodent came to a stop just at the exit of the cave. He wasn't surprised to see that his friend was not their waiting for him… so he would be the one to wait._

_

* * *

_

Sonic had waited there, for what had seemed like an eternity. His impatience aside, he had started to become worried for his friend, as slow as the buck was he felt that he should have seen him by then. When it dawned on him that he never recalled passing the young buck, he decided to go back in and look for his friend.

All he found was his sneakers…

When people started to ask questions around Mobotropolis, Sonic told the adults that he saw John Doe, his friend, heading up to the mountain. Of course, his story made the hedgehog the coward, and he made up that he was too afraid to head up the mountain himself. He felt bad about lying… but he was a kid, and at that age you do dumb things, for dumb reasons.

It's funny how one thing can lead to another though. A sort of daycare was set up for all the children of Mobotropolis, even the king himself would send his daughter there, probably to show his support in the idea to let the children of the city have a place to hang out. Before then, Sonic had never met Rotor, Antoine, Sally, or Bunnie. He made quick friends with them, even though Ante was kind of a worry wart.

Even though he was asked by his new friends about his shoes, the hedgehog kept them close. He felt that the sneakers were a way to never forget that his old friend was out there, and that he had almost lost the footware before.

* * *

As the glowing of charging lasers lit up the room, Sonic was preparing himself to dodge. Why was he thinking of such things now? Maybe it was because he was afraid he was going to lose another of his friends to this mountain. It could also be because of all the swatbot weapons bearing down on him. There was a great chance that he would get hit, even with his great speed. He wouldn't give up without a fight though; he would do all he could to save Tails.

"Take your best shot lead-heads." Sonic called out. As if in response, hot red beams rained down upon the hedgehog. His eyes traced among the incoming projectiles and in his mind a path of escape presented itself. In a flash the speedy rodent charged forward, and then jumped to the left rolling underneath a beam that scorched his quills. Glowing holes smoked as Sonic charged forward again, luckily the Swatbutts' aim was still as poor as he had recalled.

His eyes moving ahead, feeling quite secure that the bolt-heads wouldn't shoot ahead of him, Sonic noticed that the elevator was back into its down position. Why would he do that? What was he up to? The human couldn't have been confident that his metal drones to do him in so quickly… Sonic didn't like it, Snively was up to something. Tails was still in trouble, so all the paranoid feelingswould have to be set aside.

The hedgehog jumped onto the platform and smacked the button to make it rise. Sonic ducked into the metal corner below the switch. Lasers still shot into the elevator as it started to shift upwards. A sharp pain in his right arm caused him to look down, he had taken a hit, but it could have been much worse. And if the ominous feeling in the back of his mind were true, then he would leave here with a little more then a bruise.

* * *

Snively couldn't help put grin as he noticed Metal Sonic had returned with some more guests. All three of them were inside a cell, and the metallic hedgehog was sure that they could not escape, and that the hedgehog would not be able to save them. More bait for the trap, and Snively now knew he wasn't going crazy and knows how Dulcy was damaged.

He noticed that the elevator was coming up. "The rodent is on his way, let's get ready."

"I don't see the objective in having me reveal myself after presenting the hostages. Why don't I just fight him upright." The robot's impatience was well present.

"It's to draw out his emotions. If he's concerned about his friends then he would be more likely to put up a more intense fight." Snively told the battle eager machine. The tyrant was lying, at least he hope he was. He was hoping that it would actually cause him to become distracted, and that way victory would easily be his.

"Perfect… it doesn't matter, because I'll still defeat him…" Metal Sonic laughed as he moved into the shadows as ordered. Snively smiled and went back to the Wing Fortress; he wasn't going to take any chances. If by any chance this mission failed then he would run away with the real Tails, to have him robotisized. It didn't matter what the hedgehog did, weather he won, or lost this fight, he would lose everything.

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Thank you for reading, next update in a week (4/28).


	23. To Battle Oneself

Sonic stood up as he reached the top floor and the elevator came to a halt. The room was dimly lit, as if nobody was around, but the hero knew better. He stepped off the lift, and listened carefully for any sudden motion. The sound of his sneakers once again echoed off the walls.

"Sonic!" A cry suddenly cut through the silence. It echoed amongst the room causing the hedgehog to look around frantically. It was Tails, the young fox was still alive.

"Tails? Where are ya bro?" The hero did his best to look through the darkness for any sign of his friend. It didn't take long for him to notice a red glow about 30 yards away. A fox was bound above the source of the glow, in a harness and upon the end of a rope. Judging by the waves of heat blurring the light, and how Tails was acting, the reddish glimmer was probably caused by something that was extremely hot.

Seeing his friend in danger made Sonic oblivious to any other motion about him as he made a run for the fox. Suddenly the hedgehog felt himself hit by a fast moving object in the darkness, causing him to fall backward and land on his back.

With a groan the hero stood back up slowly, his ears toning back to his surroundings. As he had figured, he was not alone. Something was out there, and it wasn't Snively or a Swatbot. A clancking sound caused the hedgehog to spin about. He saw that he there he had more company then he first thought. A cell was lit by a yellow beam of light coming down from the ceiling. Three Mobians were in the cage, and Sonic could instantly recognize them.

"Sal!" The hedgehog cried out as he ran to the caged Mobians, once again letting down his guard. There was another strike causing Sonic to once again end up on the floor. Whoever, or whatever this was, it was attacking him very fast.

"Damn it…" Sonic groaned as he stood up once again. He didn't like playing this game of run around. As the hedgehog got back to his feet he noticed that Sally had aroused while he was distracted by the hit. "Sal! Are you guys ok?"

"We're fine Sonic!" She cried back. "Be careful, Snively has—"

The princess was interrupted by an annoying screech that caused the hero to plug his ears. It sounded as if someone had turned on some loud speakers. After a second, Sonic took his gloved hands away from his ears as the horrific sound died down. Another group of lights glowed revealing the large flying fortress; obviously it was where the nasty noise had come from.

"_Well, Well, it looks like the rodent didn't follow my instructions to come alone." _ The voice of the short human echoed across the room.

"Snively! Let them go, it's me you want!" Sonic yelled, even though he wasn't sure if he could even hear him. But it didn't matter right now.

The voice continued, weather he heard him and chose to ignore him, or didn't hear him at all, Sonic couldn't tell._"But… since I am such a nice person, I think I'll give you a second chance. All you have to do is beat my robot, and all of them go free. What do you say to that?"_

"I can handle anything you throw at me Sniffles! Anytime, anywhere!" Sonic was becoming annoyed with this game of chase. He just wanted his friend back, so he wouldn't have to face the race of life alone.

With the response echoing in the air, another clank of a switch filled the air. Another light beamed into the room, followed by another, until all the darkness that surrounded the hero was enveloped with light. The scenery was very familiar, it was like the lower floors, only the hedgehog could see some dark pieces scattered about the floor. It didn't take long for Sonic to recognize them as some pieces of the Death Egg, which had its pieces fall onto Mobius from high in the sky. How most of them ended up on the mountain remained a mystery, but was not really Sonic's concern at this moment. As a glimmer of the metal caught his eye, everything became clear… how his friends were captured when he had Snively distracted, and what was attacking him in the darkness just these past few moments.

For some reason the hero could not comprehend, he smirked. "Well if it ain't Metalhead, back for another round?"

The metal likeness of Sonic glared back with his red eyes. "You will not defeat me this time hedgehog, before I was made to do exactly as you, but now I hold all of your strengths, without your weaknesses."

With a laugh the hedgehog shook his head. "It just looks like ya developed a new one, ya have a problem with jabbering."

"Sonic!" The suspended fox's voice cut through the conversation, causing the blue hedgehog to look to his dangling friend. In that instant the robot made his move, attacking Sonic. Before the hero could put up his guard he was struck by Metal Sonic, causing him to launch backward, landing harshly on his back once again.

Sally cried out, wishing she wasn't behind bars, having to bear witness to this. "Sonic, don't worry about us right now… just beat him!"

The robot lunged at the downed hedgehog, rolling up into a razor blade like roll as it plunged down to attack its adversary. Sonic gasped and rolled over to the right, the sharp blade-like metal scratched into the floor sending sparks into the air that stung a bit as they came in contact with the hero. "Workin' on it Sal!" He cried back to the princess.

* * *

Bunnie started to feel the world come back to her. "My stars…" she groaned, as she started to sit up. She tried to move her robotic arm, and to her surprise it moved. It must be that the electronic pulse had finished paralyzing her systems. As coldness ran through her, and it made her realize that she still was alive, she felt a rush of relief. Her celebration was cut short, however as the rabbot took in her surroundings. Metal bars surround where she was sitting, and she noticed she was not alone. The albino mouse from the Downunda region remained unconscious at one side of her, and Sally Acorn was looking out of the bars, watching something outside intensely. 

Looking past the princess a cold metallic blur could be seen collided with one of blue. Obviously Bunnie could tell that the battle was on, and like the last time the two clashed, it was impossible to tell who was coming out on top. She looked to the white mouse and shook him hard, "Suga… hey!" the rabbot whispered harshly as she tried to rise him from unconsciousness.

Sally looked back to notice that her friend had awakened. She sighed in relief and rushed over to her aide, "Are you alright Bunnie?"

"Fine Sally-girl, just a massive ol' throb in da head. Nothin' too bad. Hope Whitey here is ok, he seems to be out pretty good." They looked to the downed mouse, who still felt warm to the touch, which was a good sign.

"He'll come back in time Bunnie." She said looking back out the cage to the battle in progress, the sounds of the rushing rivals, and the clashing of their attacks echoed throughout the room. It didn't take long before the rabbot got sick of watching and tried to take matters into her own hands.

Bunnie approached the cage bars. "Stand back Sally-girl!" she cried. Sally stood back, realizing that if anything could get them out of this situation, the rabbot's strength could. With a cry the metal hand of the bunny smashed into the metal bar, what caught her off guard though was that the bar did not budge, not even an inch. These bars were not made of ordinary metal that was for sure.

"It must be some kind of alloy." Sally explained as she observed the cage more thoroughly. "Metal Sonic probably was smart enough to realize the strength your robotic limbs would produce."

"Damn him…" Bunnie said lightly as she shook the vibrations out of her metal limb.

"What's with all the racquet?" A familiar voice called, causing the two to jump. It seemed that Jerome had finally come to.

"We were just trying to find a way out of here…" Sally said. "You think you could pick the lock? I've already tried."

The white mouse just rubbed his head and laughed, he couldn't believe that the princess would have been so stereotypical. "What do you take me for? I wasn't trained as a thief. Don't assume I am just because I am a mouse."

Apologizing, the princess sighed. "It's just Sonic's in trouble."

"Sugarhog will be fine… if any of us could bring down that tin can it'd be him."

Sally gave a nod; she really hoped that Bunnie was right. If Sonic lost this fight, then all they had fought for over the years would be lost to this mountain.

* * *

"Hurry Sonic!" The harnessed fox cried out, as Sonic was once again floored by a stray blow. Sitting up the hero whipped his mouth which was bleeding lightly. Hitting the robot was like smacking into a brick wall. The blue hedgehog's skin, however, was not as protective and he felt pain rising through him. He couldn't stop though, not with everyone counting on him, not with hope riding on his shoulders. 

"Hold on bro! I'm a bit busy…" Sonic muttered to himself, finding that he was getting annoyed at the fox's impatience. He never knew that Tails could be so whiny, many early occasions his bud was very laid back, even when in the hands of the enemy. Sonic shook it off though; he'd probably act different if he were dangling above a hot lava pit.

It was kind of funny actually, it had been so long he had heard Tails in peril that it made him think of the first day he knew the two tailed fox who would be his best friend during these hard times, and how he had grown over the time they had spent together. Strange, how it took the foreboding of losing Tails to realize how much he had grown. From being so dependent, to become a very admirable Freedom Fighter, and he was only twelve. The hero blasted forward and cried out. He could not let his bud come so far, only to be lost now. Not here… Not now!

The malevolent robot just smirked as the sudden out burst from the organic hedgehog left an opening for him to strike. Sonic couldn't stop himself in time to avoid the sharp claws swiping at him. As the slash hit him hard, the blue hedgehog flew back and slid across the floor.

Audible gasps could be heard from the cage where the three other Freedom Fighters were being kept, and as Sonic tried to get up he could see, and feel why. A trail of red was laid out on the floor between himself and his adversary. His vision became blurry, that hit was vital… how could he have been so blind as to leave himself open life that?

As the hero's vision started to fade so did his hearing. He heard his bud cry out his name, again and again, and his other companions joined him. Unable to stand the condition he was in.

"Sonic!" Tails's voice rose above them all. "Sonic!"

"_Sonic," _the voice had suddenly changed, and sounded much older, like Selim's. _"please… be with Tails and the other Freedom Fighters, they need you… you owe me that much…" _

The hero recognized this phrase… it was the last request from the older fox, before he faced the shell that used to be his Uncle Chuck. He had lost a lot that day, but made good on his promise.

Cries for his name continued on in the woozy blur. It was becoming hard to identify who the voices belonged to when another voice had cut through.

"_Sonic Hedgehog"_ the voice was one that was hard to place… but as the image of a red bird seemed to appear before his eyes, the hero realized he was being hit by another memory. _"You have more then helped us in our task of showing the young Prower his path, but we implore you to continue this, and please don't let anything happen to him, the destiny of this planet depends upon his very survival. He is the chosen one as his uncle had told us. The things he does will make sure that this planet will one day have true peace, one this planet has never truly experienced."_

A chill ran through the bleeding hedgehog. He couldn't stand letting his failures be shoved in his face again. How did he fail so miserably? He thought he was strong, and that he could protect his buddy, as he had promised to so many. The feeling of failure burst through him and caused a tear to run down his cheek.

As if the tear had cleaned his eyes and allowed him to see again, the hero's vision became clear again. He could see a cold metal foot in front of him. The figure that stood before him and let out emotionless cold words, "Do you finally see? How your weak emotions brought about your downfall? Farewell my loathsome copy…"

Metal Sonic kicked the fallen hedgehog hard causing him to lift off the ground and crash straight into rubble from the Death Egg the hero had destroyed so long ago, and buried the organic hedgehog in the metal debris. The harsh sound of the moving metal calmed to a still as the rubble settled in its new position, completely hiding the hero. Then there complete silence.

The Freedom Fighters watched, and hoped. Wishing for the slightest sign of motion, they stared upon the rubble. But as the long seconds ticked by, there was none…

0000000

Sorry for the lateness, life got in the way and the site wasn't working right for awhile. Next update on May 5th.


	24. Shattering Crystal

It seemed as if the temperature in the area had plummeted. Sally shivered as the pile of rubble settled and the room was deathly silent. She couldn't believe her eyes, her ears, and the feeling that ran over her. In defiance she cried his name out once more, letting it echo across the room, sounding choked as she started to give into her fears.

Bunnie placed a hand on her friend's back, and that seemed to bring down the walls. The princess turned and sobbed into the rabbot's shoulder. "It can't be… Bunnie… I can't believe it…"

Her friend just consoled her as best as she could. It was hard to tell her it would be alright, especially since the rabbot knew that now they were all helpless and at the mercy at the enemy they had evaded for most of their lives. Had they really come so far just to be stopped now?

Jerome held his tail in his hands, looking down with his eyes closed. It was hard to tell what he was thinking, but it was obvious he was also mourning. Bunnie wondered how long the mouse had known about Sonic, the first time he had heard of the stories of the defiant blue hedgehog, which fought against all odds and won. Now, the odds caught up, and he had to witness the crushing fall.

The rabbot looked up toward the lava pit that was across the room, to the fox dangling there. Tails was probably the hardest hit, he hung there limp, like a puppet that had had the life force sucked out of him. She wondered what was going through his mind, maybe he was longing to be dropped into the fiery depths that were below his feet. Sonic was his life… how would he be able to go on without his idol?

Maybe Bunnie was thinking of everyone else, because she was avoiding her own feelings. Wanting to forget all the times Sally would wait for the blue hedgehog, worried and stressed. All the times she would tell her friend that it was ok, and that Sonic would be alright. Not wanting to believe that she could no longer have that confidence, that the hedgehog was indestructible. Because if she lost that… she felt she'd lose everything.

* * *

The air seemed to have shifted. Knuckles looked up. It felt as if something had faded, as if a piece of him had just been taken away. Something told him that he had to hurry; he hated it when he got feelings like this, because they were usually correct.

He pushed the island a little faster with the Master Emerald, causing the palace to shake a bit. It would probably take only a dozen more minutes or so to reach his destination. He knew though, that in that amount of time, a lot can happen.

A bright light caused the echidna's thoughts to be interrupted. "What the?" he pondered as he noticed the source of the glow. The emeralds were reacting. But to what? There was nothing around here to react to. He closed his eyes, and tried to find the source of the reaction. After a few seconds, he felt it. A weak, familiar force, far off in the distance was gathering the power. Opening his eyes, the guardian spoke, "Sonic?"

* * *

"As you can see, I was correct. The hedgehog was no match for me, it is apparent we will not need the fox after all." Metal Sonic looked toward the Wing Fortress, to where he guess Snively was watched the battle.

A voice cut through the air, coming from the princess locked in the cell. "Don't you dare touch him!"

The three Mobians in the cell jostled about. Bunnie stared to kick at the bars that held them in with as much force as she could muster. Metal Sonic looked to the cage, "I don't think we need any of these weak organics? May I disassemble them as well?"

After a bit of a pause, the voice of the short human cut through the air. "Do what you want, now that the rodent is gone the rest do not matter."

Clanging steps and glowing eyes approached the three caged Freedom Fighters. The robotic hedgehog stopped at the foot of the cage and pointed a wrist laser at Sally. As the beam charged up Jerome stepped in front of the ground squirrel. "So you're not gonna let us out and we can settle this fair and square? What cowardous."

With a shake of the head the robot glared at the mouse. "It is more efficient this way, destroying you otherwise would be a delay of the inevitable." The light around the wrist started to glow more, causing Jerome to close his eyes and wait for the blow.

Something caused the robot to stop though, and look over its shoulder. It had received a strange reading on its sensors. Sally and Bunnie were confused as the robot turned away. After the pause Jerome opened his eyes, wondering why he hadn't been shot yet. Metal Sonic just stood there, staring at the pile in which Sonic had disappeared. "Impossible…" the robot said to itself.

Snively's voice sounded into the room. "What are you waiting for? Just finish them alrea—" the human also stopped as a strange yellow glow began to permeate from the rubble where Sonic had fallen. Now that he was looking on it head on, the tyrant recognized something. That piece of rubble was once a part of the Death Egg's engine, the one that contained the Chaos Emeralds during its flight. Snively was lucky no one was around to see his face go pale. Was it possible, that there was still enough of a charge left in the chamber to cause Sonic to change to that strange yellow form?

His questions were answered as a great power exploded from the rubble. The Freedom Fighters looked up to see a yellow hedgehog, its eyes a bright hazel. Sally and Bunnie had recognized this from earlier occurrences. When all the chaos emeralds were brought together, and things seemed at their most dire… it seemed that this strange event would occur. It happened once when 'Robotnik' tried to escape with the Master Emerald and Sonic destroyed the Death Egg. It also happened at Mobotropolis a few weeks ago, when Selim had to fight a reprogrammed Uncle Chuck. This was the third time this had happened, but what was odd is that the Chaos Emeralds were not present this time. How could it have been different this time?

The princess shook her head, she could probably never understand. She hardly could comprehend what had caused this phenomenon, and it was one of those things that would probably remain a mystery. All these questions paled to her feeling that Sonic was alive and well, and that they might just be saved yet.

Jerome's jaw drooped down. He never had the chance to see this spectacle, and it came as a great surprise. "W-What's going on?"

No one bothered to reply as Metal Sonic's energy detectors started to go crazy. He also had never witnessed this transformation. He had been heavily damaged down in the Sky Sanctuary during its first occurrence. If his sensors were any indication though, the hedgehog before him now was far more of a threatening opponent. The robot did not worry though, since it had beaten the hero so easily before.

Without fear the robot spoke to the yellow hedgehog. "You still lost our initial conditions, which means your allies are forfeit."

Before anyone could react the metal rodent's laser fired, hitting the unsuspecting albino mouse. The blast caused Jerome to fall back, wide eyed onto the princess he was protecting earlier. A few gasp of breath came from the severely injured rodent.

Bunnie ran up to her fallen comrades and helped Sally out from under the shot mouse. "My stars, Jerome…!" She looked to the wound on his chest, it didn't look good. As her mind rummaged through what she was going to do she looked up to see the robot had its weapon pointed right for her.

"Now for the second…" Metal Sonic stated as the laser charged to fire again, Bunnie stared, unable to move. A golden streak suddenly whipped between the robot hedgehog and the cage, causing a gust of wind to blast over the three caged Mobians. There was a pause, and during it Sally looked over her left shoulder to see that it had been Sonic who had caused that yellow streak, as he had moved across to the other side of the room. With a clank, a metal arm fell to the floor, and Metal Sonic could only stand there as he had suddenly lost the appendage he had used to shoot the caged mouse.

"You are heartless…" the glowing hedgehog said, turning to glare at his robotic counterpart.

Metal Sonic didn't take that as an insult. "Without the weakness of your emotions, I'm much stronger then you…"

With a little grin, Sonic shook his head. "You would never understand… while feeling can cause weakness, it can also cause the opposite. True power comes from the heart, and thanks to you, I can show you what that means."

The robotic hedgehog prepared to strike, but as soon as it had taken a step his opponent charged forth. A loud cracking sound filled the room as the yellow streak hit the metal square in the chest plate. Momentum from the collision caused Metal Sonic to fly back and smack square into the wall, while the glowing organic rodent stopped in front of the cage that held his friends captive.

As the metal hedgehog bounced off the steel wall and hit the floor, the red glow of its eyes faded. It seemed to be out of commission. Sally looked to her rescuer and smiled. "You had me worried for a second…"

Turing to the princess the power charged hedgehog smiled. "Sal… you've known me too long to think I'd ever let ya down." Sonic looked around the cell for any structural weaknesses. "Now ya guys get down and I'll have ya outta there in a Sonic-second."

Before he could make a move a sudden loud snap was heard echoing in the room. Like a rifle had gone off just across the room. Just then the hero's memory snapped back to him. Tails!

"Sonic!" Sally cried out as the hedgehog spun around to see the fox falling down into the fiery pit that he had once been strapped above. The orange canine's namesakes were tied together preventing him from taking flight on his own. Without thinking of anything, the power charged hero blasted toward the pit.

Everything seemed to go in slow motion… he saw images of his friend, and all the times they had together. When they first met almost 8 years ago, how helpless and alone he was. When they hung out in the forests around Knothole, training for his bud to become a member of the resistance. When Tails had hatched the plan that had thrown Robotnik at Drood Hedge, which was the day he became an official Freedom Fighter. When they had followed a contaminated river to a chemical factory and realized that the final victory at Doomsday was not so final. When they saved the Flickies from Snively's mad plans.

The memories were almost infinite.

His mind was quick, as were his feet, but the hands of time would always prove to be the ultimate enemy. The one to show that you cannot run from the end. No matter how quick you are, the things that had been with you can be easily taken away. A sudden blow came from behind, causing the hero to get knocked away from his path, and blowing any chance he had at saving his friend.

Sonic watched as the fires of the lava pit consumed his friend. He had a good view since he had been so close when the fox had hit. Flames seemed to dance off the kit's fur and the young one's last cry for his friend was cut short.

"TAILS!" cried out the hero as he jumped back up to his feet. Running to the pit, but before he could even get close, his friend had been sucked under the pit of liquid fire. The charged hedgehog had wished he hadn't stopped at the foot of the pit, and kept going, to be consumed by the hellish liquid lava himself.

It all seemed like a nightmare. One the hero had faced many times before. Only this time, as the heat of the lava pool burned through his quills, Sonic realized this was no dream. His greatest fears had become reality.

The heat was soon replaced by a chill that seemed to shower over the hedgehog, pumping through his veins. He looked to what had attacked him earlier to see the robotic hedgehog standing there. It was all that machine's fault… he had assisted in the ending of his friend's life, and now he was going to pay!

* * *

Knuckles jumped a bit as the Chaos Emeralds started to glow with a blinding fervor. Something was happening, and the guardian knew Sonic was behind it. The mountain was but a stone's throw away, however as the energies in the air became more and more disorderly the echidna realized that it didn't matter what he did now.

The explosion of chaos was imminent. Chaos Control. Even with the Master Emerald at hand he wouldn't be able to stop it. Whatever heart was in power over the emeralds was too strong to be snuffed out. What had happened in that mountain to cause this to happen?

A white glow began to envelop the room. The echidna held his breath, what had happened to Selim back in Robotropolis would now happen to him, and anything else caught in the blast radius. Knuckles hoped that the other Freedom Fighters would come through ok, as he prepared to deal with the consequences of chaos.

As the echidna disappeared, the explosion of Chaos Control continued, around the island, and heading toward Mount Gimmick.

* * *

Robotic parts laid scattered amongst the floor of the lair. Oil had gathered in a puddle next to the shattered and decapitated head of Metal Sonic. A chip that had fallen out of the inorganic cranium, and an LED blinked red, this was obviously the robots intelligence chip. Without giving a second though, the angry hero crushed the contraption under his sneaker, whipping out the last bit that was his mechanical copy.

Sally and Bunnie just stared; they had just seen the hedgehog they thought they know tear through his enemy in an animalistic rage that they had never seen before. The loss of Tails had also come as a blow, words could not be spoken to describe the pain and fear they had within them at this very moment.

A sudden strong wind whipped through the air causing the hedgehog's yellow quills to sway heavily. The roar of an engine confirmed what Sonic had suspected, the master mind behind his friend's murder was trying to make a get away. "You aren't getting away…" the irate hedgehog growled with a most uncharacteristic anger.

The Wing Fortress barely had time to lift off the ground before the bright hedgehog shot forth, slicing through the gigantic hull as if it were tissue paper. Sonic continued to take his rage out on the giant machine. Like a killer bee swarm, golden streaks swirled about the contraption, turning the metal into Swiss cheese.

Another bright light soon entered the room, a white light cut into the side of the mountain. Sally and Bunnie gasped as they had recognized it from Robotropolis, it was on the other side of the Wing Fortress from their position, but it was closing in upon the hedgehog and the flying gadget quickly.

"Sugarhog! Watch out!" The rabbot cried out.

* * *

The rattling of the fortress's large engines jostled the kit awake. It had been deathly quiet in his cell before this moment. If it weren't for worrying about Sonic, Tails probably would have fallen completely asleep. Now that they were moving again, he found himself wondering what had happened to his friend.

Before Tails could sit up there was a sudden jolt. It was violent, and the fox knew that it probably wasn't mechanical.

"What's going on?" the kit wondered aloud as the violent shakes continued to become more and more constant.

A yellow streak shot through the cell, but it was so quick that Tails could not identify what it was. There were only a few things that could move so fast though, and it made the fox realize that Sonic must have transformed. Like he did on the Death Egg, which seemed like ages ago.

The kit stared up at the gaping hole made by the hedgehog. It was high in the cell wall, giving Tails an opportunity to escape. But if Sonic was trying to help him out, then why hadn't he stopped? Why did the impacts from the hedgehog's attacks continue? Didn't Sonic realize he was still in here? As Tails used his namesakes to lift himself toward the hole in the wall, he realized that Snively had probably succeeded in fooling his friend with that copy.

"Sonic! Wait! I'm still in here!" The kit cried, hoping that he could get out.

Before he could get out of the cell a bright white light burst into the room, consuming everything. Tails didn't even have a chance to cry out as he was engulfed by the ethereal light.


	25. Fall to Pieces

The yellow hedgehog landed as the explosion of white energy started to fade. Sally and Bunnie gasped as the phenomenon they had seen before left no destruction in its wake. The Wing Fortress collapsed to the floor and erupted into a ball of flame. Luckily a set of bay doors of the base had opened for Snively's planned escape so the smoke could vent out of the room. It was so strange how the white explosion had stopped so suddenly, as it had done before, and left no structural damage.

As the hedgehog faded back to his normal blue color, the light in the room dimmed quite a bit, now only lit by the flames of the fallen aircraft. The hero gasped greatly, as he had burned a lot of his energy on that attack. Now that the anger had passed he felt the sorrow of his loss come crashing in, causing the hedgehog to fall onto his knees and sob.

Sally felt her heart sink as she leaned against the bars and watched the flames of destruction fill her eyes. She wished she could hold the hedgehog, and tell him that everything would be alright, but even she was having trouble believing that now.

Bunnie was still at Jerome's side, but she was also watching Sonic. She wanted to get out of the cage as well, but she was not going to interrupt the hero's mourning, or her own. They would wait, until he was ready to let them out.

A clank suddenly caused the three conscious freedom fighters to look up. Something was moving out of the rubble of the burning fortress. As it came closer, Bunnie made out who it was.

"Oh my stars!" the rabbot gasped as Snively was crawling on his stomach from the rubble. He was in terrible shape, and it looked like he had been cut in half during the crash. Everything from his waist down was missing, explaining why the human had to crawl. The scene was not as gruesome as it should have been though, as what hung out of the waist was not organic, but wiring.

Sonic could not believe what he was seeing. "Y-You… were nothing but a damned robot?"

The robot tried to respond to the hedgehog, however all that came out were some screechy noises that indicated the voice constructor must have been damaged in the accident. However, to everyone's surprise, another voice cut through the darkness, one that they had all come to forget and wished could remain that way.

"You were surprised hedgehog?"

At first they thought they were hearing things, that this was another trick. However, as a large figure stepped out of the shadowed corner that was behind the rubble of the once great flying fortress, the light hit the large man. The Freedom Fighters saw the one that had haunted their lives since their early childhood.

"Robotnik!" Sally cried out as the mad doctor was revealed by the light.

The evil doctor just grinned at their stunned looks. "I must thank you, Sonic… because of the chaos you created I was able to escape the void, and the torment of that cursed wizard." He looks to the shredded android that used to be called Snively. "It looks like you've also learned my little secret."

Sonic crossed his arms over his chest and shrugged. "Huh… Well, I shoulda figured that ya wouldn't have anyone by your side that wasn't a robot, 'Buttnik."

Robotnik just grinned in return. "At least he served his purpose. He kept you occupied in my absence." The doctor proclaimed as he used his rocket propelled boots to lift off and escape through the open bay doors. "I must now get back to my city. Don't worry, hedgehog, I won't do anything rash. As a token of my gratitude I will let you rodents have a day before I come after you, use it wisely."

Sally looked down in disappointment. Would this fight ever end? Why is it every time it seemed like they had become victorious, a new enemy reared their ugly head?

A flash of light caught the princess's eye as she looked at the cold metal floor. She looked up toward it and could make out that it was a key of some sort. She really needed to get out of this cage; they didn't have much time to sulk. "Sonic! There's a key on the floor!" The princess shouted to the still hedgehog.

It was as if her voice had awakened him from a deep trance. Sonic looked to see where the ground squirrel pointed and there was a key there. He walked up to it, slowly, as if his mind were racing so fast that it drained his speed. With a light glance, the hedgehog threw the key to the caged freedom fighters, it hits the floor by the cage.

Bunnie blinked once as she picked up the object from the floor. She had never seen Sonic act this way, so distant. The rabbot walked to the cell door and inserted the key into the lock, which was somewhat difficult being on the other side of the bars, but she was gradually able to open the door. Sally ran out of the door, running up to Sonic and grasping him in a tear filled hug. It was strange how the sobs were held back before, as if they were locked inside with her.

Sonic just closed his eyes and hugged back. He felt himself start to give in to the sorrow in his own chest. It seemed like a bad habit, for him to hold it in, to look confident, even in the worst of circumstances. He did it for… for the one that was gone. That thought brought down his wall. The hedgehog shoved his face into the princess's shoulder, making Sally hug him tighter and pat his back. She knew how much he meant to the hero, how much he meant to everyone.

The rabbot just stared, teary eyed as the two held each other. She had put the unconscious mouse over her metal shoulder and gotten out of the cage. Her foot right next to the debris that used to be Metal Sonic. Seeing the scrap metal made her robotic apendages feel all the colder. It looked as if she'd have to get used to the idea of having them. She would need them as long as they continued to fight. Every time though, they lost someone dear to them, and as the bitter taste of loss filled the rabbot's mouth again, she wondered who would be the next one to be lost.

Sonic suddenly jumped as something had gripped his ankle, causing the princess to release her embrace. Looking down, the hedgehog saw the android that was Snively staring back up at him.

"U stew—pid hedgggehog." The human's artificial voice choked. "U fellll forr it-t-t U-or fur-end waz n-not dropppped in-to th-uh lavvva…"

The hedgehog did not appreciate the interruption and kicked at the damaged contraption with his free foot. "Shut up…"

The broken android just laughed as best as it could. "U-or f-ox fur-end waz in th-uh W-ing forr-t-ress. Hah-ahahha…"

Sonic was about to shut the machine up for good when a voice interrupted. "Y'all may wanna come ova 'ere and take a gander at dis." Bunnie cried out. She had made her way over to the lava pool, and apparently found something that had her wide eyed and surprised.

With another kick, the hedgehog was able to make the android let go of his leg. Sonic sped over to the lave pit, wondering what had Bunnie all shaken up. The princess followed right behind, hoping that Snively was lying. If Tails was in the fortress when Sonic attacked, the hero would probably feel at fault for anything that happened to the kit.

In the pits of fire, the truth was easily seen. Patches of the 'fox's' brown fur burned, revealing a shiny interior. It was metal. Like Snively, this Tails was a phony.

Sally gasped as she turned her head to the burning wreckage of the Wing Fortress. All she could think about was how badly damaged the crash had made Snively. She could only imagine what had happened to Tails. Sonic also looked to the machine he had destroyed, and after a brief pause he started to charge for it.

"Sonic! Stop, it could blow at any minute!" Sally cried running after the hedgehog.

Coming to a stop in front of the debris, the hero looked back to Sally. "Tails could still be in there! I'm not going to give up on him…"

The princess hung her head, and was about to give into the hedgehog's wish, when there was a minor explosion that sent a chunk of metal flying a good twenty yards. It had nearly missed Sonic's head. She had lost too many today, if Tails was in there, the chance was thinner then a fox hair that he was alive. "Don't make me lose you too, Sonic. Those flames are going to hit the fuel tanks, and this entire room will erupt into a horrific explosion."

Bunnie gave a nod. "Look at Snively, sugar-hog… I dun think suga-fox would be doin' much better… my l'il nose is pickin' somthin' up in the air, we best get outta here, now."

Sonic glared at the two, he couldn't believe what they were saying. "A Freedom Fighter never gets left behind… You've told me this time and time again Sal. Now why don't ya practice what ya preach?"

Sally visibly shook."Look at the damn wreckage, Sonic! If Tails were still alive in there, don't you think we would have heard screaming? Right now Robotnik is out there, and the other Freedom Fighters can easily get caught off guard if they come looking for us. Think about them."

Sonic crossed his hands over his shoulders. "I can't believe that you'd abandon him! He was like a nephew to you, and like a brother to me!"

The princess's whole body shook. "Don't you dare say I didn't care for him! I saw in his eyes, the reason for our fight! The future that we have given everything for! Right now though, we'll have no future if we stand here and let Robotnik win. You can stay here and run away from life if you want, but Bunnie and myself will run for it."

A pause went by, and the hedgehog gave into the princess's words. If he gave up now, no one could avenge Tails. He had to stay here, and make sure Robotnik paid for everything he had done to make their life a living hell. "Alright Sal… let's get outta here."

* * *

The mouse awoke in what appeared to be a make-shift infirmary. A nasty pungent odor stung his nose, causing Jerome to cough and gag. 

"Mum's smellin' salts … gets 'em up every time, eh?" Roy, the kangaroo laughed.

If his head and chest weren't aching then the mouse probably would have laughed also. "What happened?"

"Ya took a hit, mate… square in da chest. Bloody lucky the beam didn't go clean through. Musta been the robot was in a hurry to fire." The marsupial explains as he sits by the bed side. "I wouldn't be doin' anything walk-about for awhile."

"Don't worry," Jerome looked down. "After what happened out there, I think I'll stay put for awhile. Everything that could go wrong did."

Roy nodded, "We're all in the dark. Sally told us we all gotta wait for some bloody meetin' for the details. Nobody's seen nothin' from Sonic either."

The albino mouse sat up a bit, surprised. "He hasn't come back?"

Roy shrugged. "Guess you're in the blind too, eh? I'd ask ya what happened, but the Sheila will 'probly tell us anyway. Whatever it is, mate, it doesn't look like good news. Ya guys went to save the young whelp, and he ain't come back neither."

That was the last straw, the mouse sat up and got moved his feet over the side of the bed. His ears rang a bit, but as the kangaroo had said, it could have been much worse. "I have to come to that meeting… I need to know what happened."

* * *

Everyone was present who was expected, and still the room was gravely silent. Usually meeting would be littered with side speak before Sally called it to order, but this was far from the case. The room was gravely silent, all eyes on the princess, ready to hear the details, on what happened, and what they were going to do. 

The princess seemed like she was having trouble starting. She tried to speak, but words could not come to her. Bunnie was sitting next to her and looked concerned for her friend, and the silence was making the room feel morbid. "Sally-girl?" The rabbot whispered, trying to get someone to say something.

"E-everyone." Sally choked, "the worst has happened…"

Jerome listened on as the princess explained their capture, and the battle between Sonic and his metal counterpart. It was when she got to the part after the mouse was knocked out that shocked everyone in the room. Tails had been lost.

Rotor looked down and shook his head. He had seen the kit develop in his ability to work with mechanics. Tails had even surpassed him, in only a few years of learning. To have lost such a prodigy was a massive blow. The walrus looked about the table to see that the hit to morale was equally shared amongst them all.

To add insult to injury, the news of Robotnik's return, and Snively being an android shook the room. They all felt exhausted, tired of all the fighting, and hiding in this hole in the ground. But they kept silent, letting their leader continue with her slew of bad news.

"After we left the mountain, Sonic ran off… without a word…" Sally teared up.

"Is he… coming back?" Rotor asked.

The princess sat up and slammed a fist into the table, glaring at the walrus. "If I knew that I—" she paused as she realized that she went a little over board. There was a pause as the leader looked down again. "E-excuse me…"

With those words the meeting came to an ending, Sally running out of the room, her rabbit friend following. Rotor sat at the table, knowing that it was her stress talking, and that she wasn't really mad at him.

"Everythings goin' to bloody hell…" Roy sighed, shaking his head.

Rotor shook his head. "I know, I didn't even get a chance to tell her that we've lost communication with Knuckles, the Floating Island receiver is still there, but no sign of the guardian."

Jerome couldn't help but sigh as well, he wondered if Sonic was ok.

* * *

Sonic just kept running, along the coast, away from everyone and everything. No matter how fast he went though, his mind kept going back to his bud. How scared the kit must have been, alone in the Wing Fortress, by himself. How could it have ended up this way? A piece of the hero wished that Selim hadn't come, that he be the one that was dead. Tails was a big reason for their fight. With him gone, the future of the planet suddenly darkened, like the sky did above him. 

It was sort of ironic in a way, as the darkness of the night was coming in so fast. He knew it was probably because he was running against the world rotation. He kept running, but his thoughts stuck with him. The smile of the kitsune's face when he had done good, the shame in his eyes when he did wrong. All they could ever be now were engraved memories.

The hero felt his legs go numb as he had reached a pier overlooking the ocean of the Eastern Coast. Sonic couldn't explain why his legs felt as they did. He normally could run for much longer.

Night now enveloped the sky, and there were only a few scattered clouds. The weather was so clear, but Sonic's head was so clouded with memories. He couldn't look back, and there was no where to run in front of him… so he did the only thing he could do and fell onto his back.

He took a few gasping breaths as he looked to his side, and it hit him over again that he was alone. Many times he would watch the stars with his friend, and the young fox would comment on how cool they were. Sonic would nod and tell him that 'Robotnik would cloud the skies and take it away.' It was a lot like when they were on the bridge on Flicky Island…

A tear fell over his cheek, these memories stung him deep. He gazed back at the stars, and his felt his heart skip a beat. His eyes caught what he could swear was an image of the fox smiling down, and watching over him.

VVVVV

"That can't be how it ended!" The older Tails was angry at this turn of events. "I'm here and alive, this can't be how it ends."

The single tailed fox nodded, "This is but the dawn of the confusion caused by Chaos Control… the ability to travel to time and space will lead you and your friends on journeies you couldn't foresee… you didn't die there, you were—"

There was noise that sounded like a massive explosion. The darker fox almost seemed to turn a bit pale as he turned to the emptieness of the Void, a darkness spreading across the entire area. "No… it's too late."

"What is going on?" The older two tailed vulpine looked about as streaks of green spreading from the deep clouds.

"It has happened…" Was all the form said as he turned away to look at the oncoming darkness… "I have no choice, you have to go back now, but take this…" A flash of blue light shone down as a gem entered into the older fox's paw. "Keep that with you, it'll make sure that your memories will remain safe, and come back to you slowly… it's up to you to remember now… and change the events that are attacking the Void… and time itself… now go!"

And with that everything went dark. 'Selim' eager to find out what was going on, and to go home again. However a fear of not knowing where he was going, or who he was up against, scared him.

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Long Author's Notes:

"It was a lot like when they were on the bridge on Flicky Island…" See chapter 2 for more details. -- Did I just pull an 'Rchie'? (can't use their name I guess, cause they are on the DNP list)

In a few hours I'll be another year older, and with that I bring an end to the second fanfiction. I thank all of you for coming along for the ride, and hope you come back for next year's story. After alot of consideration I'm going to try something different with the last one. Instead of going thorough all the memories slowly while Selim is sitting there doing nothing, I will instead make the next story my last one of this little saga.

Lets face it, I'm not getting any younger, and its getting harder and harder to concentrate on my hobbies. So what I'll do is write the final part of the story with Selim fighting in the future he came from, and at the same time trying to gather his memories. This will probably be a little more confusing to the reader at first, but that is the downside to it.

Thanks again, hope you enjoyed this season, and the next one will start sometime in September. Hopefully I can get enough written over the summer so I can continue to make regular updates.

Peace out.


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